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r,iii(j,K  \i)t  ■' 


THE 


WORKS 


OF 


CHARLES     LAMB. 


TO   WHICH    ARE    PREPIXED, 


HIS     LETTERS 


AND 


A  SKETCH  OF  HIS  LIFE, 

BY 

THOMAS     NOON     TALFUURD, 

OSK    OF   HIS    EXKCUTORS. 


IN      TWO      VOLUMES. 

VOL.    I. 


NEW-YORK : 

HARPER    &c    BROTHERS,    82    CLIFF- ST. 
184  5. 


C  ON  TE  NTS 


OF 


THE   FIRST    VOLUME. 


PAGE 

Dedication 8 

Preface       9 

CHAPTER  I. 

[1775  to  1796.] 
Lamb's  Parentage,  Schooldays,  and  Youth,  to  the   Commencement 

of  his  Correspondence  with  Coleridge 11 

CHAPTER  II. 

[1796.] 

Letters  to  Coleridge 22 

"^                                 CHAPTER  IIL 
[1797.] 
Letters  to  Coleridge 36 

CHAPTER  IV. 

1  [1798.] 

^Lamb's  Literary  Efforts  and  Correspondence  with  Southey        .        .         51 

CHAPTER  V.  "~*" 

[1799,  1800.] 
Letters  to  Southey,  Coleridge,  Manning,  and  Wordsworth         .        .  67 

CHAPTER  VI. 

[1800.] 
Letters  to  Manning,  after  Lamb's  removal  to  the  Temple  ...         90 

CHAPTER  VIL 
[1801  to  1804.] 
John  Woodvil  Rejected,  Published,  and  Reviewed.— Letters  to  Man- 
ning, Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge 104 

CHAPTER  Vm. 

[180-1  to  1806.] 

Letters  to  Manning,  Wordsworth,  Rickman,  and  Hazlitt.— "  Mr.  H." 

written,  accepted,  damned 127 

CHAPTER  IX. 

[1807  to  1814.] 
Letters  to  Manning,  Montague,  Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge       ,        .        148 


4 
CONTENTS. 

PA6B 

CHAPTER  X. 

[1815  to  1817.] 

Letters  to  Wordsworth,  Southey,  and  Manning 165 

CHAPTER  XI. 

[1818  to  1820.] 

Letters  to  Mrs.  Wordsworth,  Southey,  Manning,  and  Coleridge         .        183 

CHAPTER  Xn. 

[1820  to  1823.] 

Letters  to  Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Field,  Wilson,  and  Barton    .        .        194 

CHAPTER  XUL 

[1823.] 

Lamb's  Controversy  with  Southey 211 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

[1823  to  1825.] 

Letters  to  Ainsworth,  Barton,  and  Coleridge 230 

CHAPTER  XV. 

[1825] 
Lamb's  Emancipation  from  the  India  House 245 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

[182G  to  1828.] 
Letters  to  Robinson,  Carey,  Coleridge,  Patmore,  Procter,  and  Barton        254 

CHAPTER  XVII. 

[1829,  1830.] 

Letters  to  Robinson,  Procter,  Barton,  Wilson,  Oilman,  Wordsworth, 

and  Dyer 271 

CHAPTER  XVIII. 

[18.30  to  1834. 

Lamb's  last  Letters  and  Death 296 


POEMS. 

Hester 331 

'I'o  Charles  Lloyd,  an  Unexpected  Visiter 332 

Tiio  Three  Friends 3.33 

To  a  Rivf-r  in  which  a  Child  was  drowned 338 

The  Old  Familiar  Faces 338 

A  Vision  of  Heppntance 339 

Queen  Oriana's  Dream  . 341 

A  Ballad,  noting  the  Difference  of  Rich  and  Poor,  in  the  ways  of  a 

rich  Noble's  Palace  and  a  poor  Workhouse        ....  342 

Hypochondriacus 343 

A  Farewell  to  Tobacco 344 

To  T.  L.  H.,  a  Child 348 

Ballad,  from  the  German 349 

Lines  on  the  celebrated  Picture  by  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  called  the  Vir- 
gin of  the  Rocks  .        ; 350 


CONTENTS.  • 

PAGE. 
SONNETS. 

I.  To  Miss  Kelly .        .  351 

II.  On  the  Sight  of  Swans  in  Kensington  Garden    .        .        .        .  351 

III 352 

IV                 352 

V"       ' 353 

Vl'       '                  353 

VH.'       '. 354 

V) II.  The  Family  Name 354 

IX.  To  John  Lamb,  Esq.,  of  the  South  Sea  House  .        .        .        .  355 

X 355 

XI .356 

BLANK  VERSE. 

Childhood       - 357 

The  Grandame •  357 

The  Sabbath  Bells 358 

Fancy  employed  on  Divine  Subjects 359 

Composed  at  Midnight 359 

John  Woodvil,  a  Tragedy 361 

The  Witch,  a  Dramatic  Sketch  of  the  Seventeenth  Century       .        .  397 

ALBUM  VERSES,  &c. 

In  the  Album  of  a  Clergyman's  Lady 401 

In  the  Autograph  Book  of  Mrs.  Sergeant  W ....  401 

In  the  Album  of  Edith  S 402 

To  Dora  W ,  on  being  asked  by  her  Father  to  write  in  her  Album  402 

In  the  Album  of  Rotha  Q 403 

In  the  Album  of  Catharine  Orkney 403 

In  the  Album  of  Lucy  Barton 404 

In  the  Album  of  Miss 405 

In  the  Album  of  Mrs.  Jane  Towers 405 

In  my  own  Album 406 

Angel  Help 407 

The  Christening 408 

(>n  an  Infant  dying  as  soon  as  Born 408 

1  he  Young  Catechist 410 

She  is  Gomg 411 

To  a  Young  Friend,  on  her  Twenty-first  Birthday       .        .        .        .  411 

Harmony  in  Unlikeness •        .  412 

Written  at  Cambridge 413 

To  a  celebrated  Female  Performer  in  ihe  "  Blind  Boy'-'       .        .        .  413 

Work 414 

Leisure 414 

To  Samuel  Rogers,  Esq 415 

The  Gipsy's  Malison 415 

To  the  Author  of  Poems  published  under  the  Name  of  Barry  Corn- 
wall       416 

To  J.  S.  Knowles,  Esq.,  on  his  Tragedy  of  Virginius  ....  416 

To  the  Editor  of  the  "  Every  day  Book" 417 

To  T.  Stothard,  E.sq.,  on  his  Illustrations  of  the  Poems  of  Mr.  Rogers  418 

To  a  Friend  on  his  Marriage 418 

The  Self-enchanted 419 

To  Louisa -M ,  whom  I  used  to  call  "  Monkey"      ....  420 

Oh  lift  with  Reverent  hand             420 

On  a  Sepulchral  Statue  of  an  Infant  Sleeping 421 

The  Rival  Bells 421 

Epitaph  on  a  Dog           ..........  422 

The  Ballad-singers 423 

To  David  Cook,  of  the  Parish  of  Saint  Margaret's,  Westminster, 

Watchman 424 


CONTENTS. 


On  a  Deaf  and  Dumb  Artist  . 

Newton's  Principia 

The  Housekeeper 

The  Female  Orators 

Phidaric  Ode  to  the  Tread-mill 

Going  or  Gone 

Free  Thoughts  on  several  Eminent  Composers 

The  Wife's  Trial ;  or,  the  Intruding  Widow 


PAGE 

426 
426 
427 
427 
428 
430 
433 
43.''i 


THE 


LETTERS 


CHARLES     LAMB 


WITH 


A  SKETCH  OF  HIS  LIFE, 


BY 


THOMAS    NOON    TALFOURD, 

ONK   OF   HIS   EXECUTORS. 


TO 


MARY    ANNE     LAMB 
^Tfjese  Sletters, 

THE    MEMORIALS    OF    MANY   YEARS    WHICH    SHE    SPENT   WITH    THE 
WRITER    IN    UNDIVIDED  AFFECTION  ; 

OF    THE    SORROWS   AND   THE    JOYS    SHE    SHARED; 

OF 

THE    GENIUS   WHICH    SHE  CHERISHED; 

AND  OF 

THE  EXCELLENCES  WHICH  SHE  BEST  KNEW, 

AKE  RESPECTFULLY  AND  AFFECTIONATELY  DEDICATED, 

BY  THE  EDITOR. 


PREFACE. 


The  share  of  the  editor  in  these  volumes  can  scarcely 
be  regarded  too  slightly.  The  successive  publications  of 
Lamb's  works  form  almost  the  only  events  of  his  life 
which  can  be  recorded ;  and  upon  these  criticism  has 
been  nearly  exhausted.  Little,  therefore,  was  necessary 
to  accompany  the  letters,  except  such  thread  of  narrative 
as  njight  connect  them  together,  and  such  explanations  as 
might  render  their  allusions  generally  understood.  The 
reader's  gratitude  for  the  pleasure  which  he  will  derive 
from  these  memorials  of  one  of  the  most  delightful  of 
Englisli  writers,  is  wholly  due  to  his  correspondents,  who 
have  kindly  intrusted  the  precious  relics  to  the  care  of 
the  editor,  and  have  permitted  them  to  be  given  to  the 
world ;  and  to  Mr.  Moxon,  by  whose  interest  and  zeal 
they  have  been  chiefly  collected.  He  may  be  allowed  to 
express  his  personal  sense  of  the  honour  which  he  has  re- 
ceived in  such  trust  from  men,  some  of  whom  are  among 
the  greatest  of  England's  living  authors  :  to  Wordsworth, 
Southey,  Manning,  Barton,  Procter,  Oilman,  Palmore, 
Walter  Wilson,  Field,  Robinson,  Dyer,  Carey,  Ains- 
worth,  to  Mr.  Green,  the  executor  of  Coleridge,  and  to 
the  surviving  relatives  of  Hazlitt.  He  is  also  most  grate- 
ful to  Lamb's  esteemed  schoolfellow,  Mr.  Le  Grice,  for 
supplying  an  interesting  part  of  his  history,  and  to  Mr. 
Montague  and  Miss  Beetham  for  the  remembered  snatches 
of  [lis  conversation  which  accompany  the  closing  chapter. 
Of  the  few  additional  facts  of  Lamb's  history,  the  chief 
have  been  supplied  by  Mr.  Moxon,  in  whose  welfare  he 
took  a  most  affectionate  interest  to  the  close  of  his  life, 
and  who  has  devoted  some  beautiful  sonnets  to  his 
memory. 

The  recentness  of  the  period  of  some  of  the  letters  has 


X  PREFACE. 

rendered  it  necessary  to  omit  many  portions  of  them,  m 
which  the  humour  and  beauty  are  interwoven  with  per- 
sonal references,  which,  although  wholly  free  from  any- 
thing which,  rightly  understood,  could  give  pain  to  any 
human  being,  touch  on  subjects  too  sacred  for  public  ex- 
posure. Some  of  the  personal  allusions  which  have  been 
retained  may  seem,  perhaps,  too  free  to  a  stranger ;  but 
they  have  been  retained  only  in  cases  in  which  the  editor 
is  well  assured  the  parties  would  be  rather  gratified  than 
displeased  at  seeing  their  names  connected  in  lifelike  asso- 
ciation with  one  so  dear  to  their  memories. 

The  italics  and  the  capitals  are  invariably  those  indi- 
cated by  the  MSS.  It  is  to  be  regretted  that  in  the 
printed  letters  the  reader  must  lose  the  curious  varieties 
of  writing  with  which  the  originals  abound,  and  which 
are  scrupulously  adapted  to  the  subjects.  The  letters 
are  usually  undated.  Where  the  date  occurs  it  has  gen- 
erally been  given  ;  and  much  trouble  has  been  necessary 
to  assign  to  many  of  the  letters  (the  postmarks  of  which 
are  not  legible)  their  proper  place,  and  perhaps  not  always 
with  complete  success. 

Many  letters  yet  remain  unpublished,  which  will  fur- 
ther illustrate  the  character  of  Mr.  Lamb,  but  which  must 
be  reserved  for  a  future  time,  when  the  editor  hopes  to  do 
more  justice  to  his  own  sense  of  the  genius  and  the  ex- 
cellences of  his  friend  than  it  has  been  possible  for  him 
to  accomplish  in  these  volumes. 

T.  N.  T. 

Russell  Square,  26th  June,  1837. 


L  E  T  T  E  R  S,  &  c, 


OF 


CHARLES     LAMB. 


CHAPTER  I. 

[1775  to  1796.] 

Lamb's  Parentage,  Schooldays,  and  Youth,  to  the  Commencement  of  his 
Correspondence  with  Coleridge. 

Charles  Lamb  was  bom  on  the  18th  February,  1775,  in 
Crown-ofRce  Row,  in  the  Inner  Temple,  where  he  spent  the 
first  seven  years  of  his  life.  His  parents  were  in  a  humble 
station,  but  they  were  endued  with  sentiments  and  with  man- 
ners which  might  well  become  the  gentlest  blood  ;  and  for- 
tune, which  had  denied  them  wealth,  enabled  them  to  bestow 
on  their  children  some  of  the  happiest  intellectual  advantages 
which  wealth  ever  confers.  His  father,  Mr.  John  Lamb,  who 
came  up  a  little  boy  from  Lincoln,  fortunately,  both  for  him- 
self and  his  master,  entered  into  the  service  of  Mr.  Salt,  one 
of  the  benchers  of  the  Inner  Temple,  a  widower,  who,  growing 
old  within  its  precincts,  was  enabled  to  appreciate  and  to  re- 
ward his  devotedness  and  intelligence  ;  and  to  whom  he  be- 
came, in  the  language  of  his  son,  "  his  clerk,  his  good  servant, 
his  dresser,  his  friend,  his  flapper,  his  guide,  stopwatch,  audi- 
tor, treasurer."*     Although  contented  with  his  lot,  and  dis- 

*  Lamb  has  given  characters  of  his  father  (under  the  name  of  Lovel)  and 
of  Mr.  Salt  in  one  of  the  most  exquisite  of  all  the  Essays  of  P^.lia,  "  The  (lid 
Benchers  of  the  Inner  Temple."  Of  Lovel  he  says.  "  He  was  a  man  of  an  in- 
corrigible and  losing  honesty.  A  good  fellow  withal,  and  could  .smite.  In 
the  cause  of  the  oppressed  he  never  considered  inequalities,  or  calculated 
the  number  of  his  opponents.  He  once  wrested  a  sword  out  of  tlijo  hand  uf  a 
man  of  quality  that  had  drawn  upon  him,  and  pommelled  him  severely  with 
the  hilt  of  it.  The  sword.sman  had  offered  insult  to  a  female,  an  occasion 
upon  which  no  odds  against  him  could  have  prevented  the  interference  of  Lovel. 
He  would  stand  next  day  bareheaded  to  the  same  person,  modestly  to  excuse 
nis  interference  ;  for  L.  never  forgot  rank,  where  something  better  was  not 
concerned.  L.  was  the  liveliest  little  follow  breathing;  had  a  face  as  gay  as 
Garrick'.s,  who  ti  he  was  said  greatly  to  resemble;  nossesseil  a  fine  turn  for 
humorous  poetry — next  to  Swift  and  Prior  ;  moulded  heads  in  clay  or  plastei 


12       PARENTAGE,  SCHOOLDAYS,  AND  YOUTH. 

charging  its  duties  with  the  most  patient  assiduity,  he  was 
not  without  Hterary  ambition ;  and,  having  written  some  occa- 
sional verses  to  grace  the  festivities  of  a  benefit  society  of 
which  he  was  a  member,  was  encouraged  by  his  brother 
members  to  pubUsh,  in  a  thin  quarto,  "  Poetical  Pieces  on 
several  occasions."  This  volume  contains  a  lively  picture  of 
the  life  of  a  lady's  footman  of  the  last  century  ;  the  "  History 
of  Joseph,"  told  in  well-measured,  heroic  couplets  ;  and  a 
pleasant  piece  after  the  manner  of  "  Gay's  Fables,"  entitled 
the  "  Sparrow's  Wedding,"  which  was  the  author's  favourite, 
and  which,  when  he  fell  into  the  dotage  of  age,  he  delighted 
to  hear  Charles  read.*  His  wife  was  a  woman  of  appearance 
so  matronly  and  commanding  that,  according  to  the  recollec- 
tion of  one  of  Lamb's  dearest  schoolmates,  "  she  might  be 
taken  for  a  sister  of  Mrs.  Siddons."  This  excellent  couple 
were  blessed  with  three  children,  John,  Mary,  and  Charles  ; 
John  being  twelve  and  Mary  ten  years  older  than  Charles. 
John,  who  is  vividly  described  in  the  essays  of  Elia,  entitled 
"  My  Relations,"  under  the  name  of  James  Elia,  rose  to  fill  a 
lucrative  office  in  the  South  Sea  House,  and  died  a  few  years 
ago,  having  to  the  last  fulfilled  the  affectionate  injunction  of 
Charles  to  "  keep  the  elder  brother  up  in  state."  Mary  (the 
Bridget  of  the  same  essay)  still  survives,  to  mourn  the  sever- 
ance of  a  life-long  association,  as  free  from  every  alloy  of 
selfishness,  as  remarkable  for  moral  beauty,  as  this  world  ever 
witnessed  in  brother  and  sister. 

of  Paris  to  admiration,  by  dint  of  natural  genius  merely ;  turned  cribbage- 
boards  and  such  small  toys  to  perfection  ;  took  a  hand  at  quadrille  or  bowls 
with  equal  facility  ;  made  punch  better  than  any  man  of  his  degree  in  Eng- 
land ;  had  the  merriest  quips  and  conceits  ;  and  was  altogether  as  brimful  of 
rogueries  and  inventions  as  you  could  desire.  He  was  a  brother  of  the  angle, 
moreover,  and  just  such  a  free,  hearty,  honest  companion  as  Mr.  Izaak  Wal- 
ton would  have  chosen  to  go  a  fishing  with. — Prose  Works,  vol.  i.,  p.  104. 

■*■  The  following  Utile  poem,  entitled  "  A  Letter  from  a  Child  to  its  Grand- 
mother," written  by  Mr.  John  Lamb  for  his  eldest  son,  though  possessing  no 
merit  beyond  simplicity  of  expression,  may  show  the  manner  in  which  he  en 
deavoured  to  discharge  his  parental  duties  : — 

"  Dear  Grandam, 

Pray  to  God  to  bless 
Your  grandson  dear  with  happiness  ; 
That,  as  1  do  advance  each  year, 
I  may  be  taught  my  God  to  fear  ; 
My  little  frame  from  passion  free, 
To  man's  estate  from  infancy  ; 
From  vice,  tJiat  turns  a  youth  aside, 
And  to  have  wisdom  for  my  guide ; 
That  I  may  neither  He  nor  swear. 
But  in  the  path  of  virtue  steer; 
My  actions  generous,  firm,  and  just, 
Be  always  faithful  to  my  trust ; 
And  thee  the  Lord  will  ever  bless. 
Your  grandson  dear, 

John  L ,  the  Less. 


PARENTAGE,    SCHOOLDAYS,    AND    YOUTH.  13 

On  the  9th  of  October,  1782,  when  Charles  Lamb  had  at- 
tained the  age  of  seven,  he  was  presented  to  the  school  of 
Christ's  Hospital  by  Timothy  Yeates,  Esq.,  governor,  as  "  the 
son  of  John  Lamb,  scrivener,  and  Elizabeth  his  wife,"  and 
remained  a  scholar  of  that  noble  establishment  till  he  had  en- 
tered into  his  fifteenth  year.  Small  of  stature,  delicate  of  frame, 
and  constitutionally  nervous  and  timid,  he  would  seem  unfit- 
ted to  encounter  the  discipline  of  a  school  formed  to  restram 
some  hundreds  of  lads  in  the  heart  of  the  metropolis,  or  to 
fight  his  way  among  them.  But  the  sweetness  of  his  dispo- 
sition won  him  favour  from  all  ;  and  although  the  antique  pe- 
culiarities of  the  school  tinged  his  opening  imagination,  they 
did  not  sadden  his  childhood.  One  of  his  schoolfellows,  of 
whose  genial  qualities  he  has  made  affectionate  mention  in 
his  '•  Recollections  of  Christ's  Hospital,"  Charles  V.  Le  Grice, 
now  of  Treriefe,  near  Penzance,  has  supplied  me  with  some 
particulars  of  his  schooldays,  for  which  friends  of  a  later  date 
will  be  grateful.  "  Lamb,"  says  Mr.  Le  Grice,  "  was  an 
amiable,  gentle  boy,  very  sensible,  and  keenly  observing,  in- 
dulged by  his  schoolfellows  and  by  his  master  on  account  of 
his  infirmity  of  speech.  His  countenance  was  mild ;  his 
complexion  clear  brown,  with  an  expression  which  might  lead 
you  to  think  that  he  was  of  Jewish  descent.  His  eyes  were 
not  each  of  the  same  colour  :  one  was  hazel,  the  other  had 
specks  of  gray  in  the  iris,  mingled  as  we  see  red  spots  in  the 
bloodstone.  His  step  was  plantigrade,  which  made  his  walk 
slow  and  peculiar,  adding  to  the  staid  appearance  of  his  fig- 
ure. I  never  heard  his  name  mentioned  without  the  addition 
of  Charles,  although,  as  there  was  no  other  boy  of  the  name 
of  Lamb,  the  addition  was  unnecessary  ;  but  there  was  an  im- 
plied kindness  in  it,  and  it  was  a  proof  that  his  gentle  man- 
ners excited  that  kindness. 

'•His  delicate  frame  and  his  difficulty  of  utterance,  which 
was  increased  by  agitation,  unfitted  him  for  joining  in  any 
boisterous  sport.  Vhe  description  which  he  gives  in  his 
'  Recollections  of  Christ's  Hospital'  of  the  habits  and  feel- 
ings of  the  schoolboy,  is  a  true  one  in  general,  but  is  more 
particularly  a  delineation  of  himself — the  feelings  were  all  in 
his  own  heart — the  portrait  was  his  own  :  '  While  others 
were  all  fire  and  play,  he  stole  along  with  all  the  self-concen- 
tration of  a  young  monk.'  These  habits  and  feelings  were 
awakened  and  cherished  in  him  by  peculiar  circumstances ; 
he  had  been  born  and  bred  in  the  Inner  Temple ;  and  his  pa- 
rents continued  to  reside  there  while  he  was  at  school,  so  that 
he  passed  from  cloister  to  cloister,  and  this  was  all  the  change 
his  young  mind  ever  knew.  On  every  half-holyday  (and  there 
2 


14  PARENTAGE,   SCHOOLDAYS,   AND    YOUTH. 

were  two  in  the  week)  in  ten  minutes  he  was  in  the  gardens,  on 
the  terrace,  or  at  the  fountain  of  the  Temple :  here  was  his  home ; 
here  his  recreation;  and  the  influence  they  had  on  his  infant 
mind  is  vividly  shown  in  his  description  of  the  old  Benchers. 
He  says,  '  I  was  born  and  passed  the  first  seven  years  of  my  life 
in  the  Temple ;'  he  might  have  added,  that  here  he  passed  a 
great  portion  of  the  second  seven  years  of  his  life,  a  portion 
which  mixed  itself  with  all  his  habits  and  enjoyments,  and  gave 
a  bias  to  the  whole.  Here  he  found  a  happy  home,  affectionate 
parents,  and  a  sister  who  watched  over  him  to  the  latest  hour 
of  his  existence  (God  be  with  her !)  with  the  tenderest  solici- 
tude ;  and  here  he  had  access  to  the  library  of  Mr.  Salt,  one 
of  the  benchers,  to  whose  memory  his  pen  has  given  in  re- 
turn for  this  and  greater  favours — I  do  not  think  it  extravagant 
to  say — immortality.  To  use  his  own  language,  '  Here  he 
was  tumbled  into  a  spacious  closet  of  good  old  English  read- 
ing, where  he  browsed  at  will  upon  that  fair  and  wholesome 
pasturage.'  He  applied  these  words  to  his  sister ;  but  there 
is  no  doubt  they  'browsed' together  ;  they  had  walked  hand  in 
hand  from  a  time  '  extending  beyond  the  period  of  their  mem- 
ory.' " 

When  Lamb  left  school,  he  was  in  the  lower  division  of 
the  second  class — which,  in  the  language  of  the  scliool,  is 
termed  "  being  in  Greek,  but  not  Deputy  Grecian."  He  had 
read  Virgil,  Sallust,  Terence,  selections  from  Lucian's  Dia- 
logues, and  Xenophon  ;  and  had  evinced  considerable  skill  in 
the  niceties  of  Latin  composition,  both  in  prose  and  verse. 
His  docility  and  aptitude  for  the  attainment  of  classical 
knowledge  would  have  ensured  him  an  exhibition  ;  but  to 
this  the  impediment  in  his  speech  proved  an  insuperable  ob- 
stacle. The  exhibitions  were  given  under  the  implied,  if  not 
expressed  condition  of  entering  into  the  church  ;  the  whole 
course  of  education  was  preparatory  to  that  end  ;  and,  there- 
fore, Lamb,  who  was  unfitted  by  nature  for  the  clerical  pro- 
fession, was  not  adopted  into  the  class  which  led  to  it,  and 
left  school  to  pursue  the  uncongenial  labour  of  the  "  desk's 
dull  wood."  To  this  apparently  hard  lot  he  submitted  with 
cheerfulness,  and  saw  his  schoolfellows  of  his  own  standing- 
depart,  one  after  another,  for  the  University,  without  a  mur- 
mur. 'I'his  acquiescence  in  his  different  fortune  must  have 
been  a  hard  trial  for  the  sweetness  of  his  disposition  ;  as  he 
always,  in  after  life,  regarded  the  ancient  seats  of  learnino- 
with  the  fondness  of  one  who  had  been  hardly  divorced  from 
them.  He  delighted,  when  other  duties  did  not  hinder,  to 
pass  his  vacations  in  their  neighbourhood,  and  indulge  in  that 
fancied  association  with  them  which  he  has  so  beautifully 


PARENTAGE,  SCHOOLDAYS,  AND  YOUTH.      15 

mirrored  in  his  "  Sonnets  written  at  Cambridge."*  What 
worldly  success  can,  indeed,  ever  compensate  for  the  want  of 
timely  nurture  beneath  the  shade  of  one  of  these  venerable 
institutions  ;  for  the  sense  of  antiquity  shading,  not  check- 
ing, the  joyous  impulses  of  opening  manhood  ;  for  the  refine- 
ment and  the  grace  there  interfused  into  tlie  long  labour  of 
ambitious  study  ;  for  young  friendships  consecrated  by  the 
associations  of  long  past  time  ;  and  for  liberal  emulation, 
crowned  by  successes  restrained  from  ungenerous  and  selfish 
pride  by  palpable  symbols  of  the  genius  and  the  learning  of 
ages  ? 

On  23d  November,  1789,  Lamb  finally  left  Christ's  Hos- 
pital for  the  abode  of  his  parents,  who  still  resided  in  the 
Temple.  At  first  he  was  employed  in  the  South  Sea  House, 
under  his  brother  John  ;  but,  on  5th  of  Aj)ril,  1792,  he  ob- 
tained an  appointment  in  the  accountant's  ofiice  of  the  East 
India  Company.  His  salary,  though  then  small,  was  a  wel- 
come addition  to  the  scanty  means  of  his  parents  ;  who  now 
were  unable,  by  their  own  exertions,  to  increase  it,  his 
mother  being  in  ill  health,  which  confined  her  to  her  bed,  and 
his  father  sinking  into  dotage.  On  their  comfort,  however, 
this,  and,  what  was  more  precious  to  him,  his  little  leisure, 
were  freely  bestowed  ;  and  his  recreations  were  confined  tf> 
a  delightful  visit  to  the  two  shilling  gallery  of  the  theatre,  hi 
company  with  his  sister,  and  an  occasional  supper  with  some 
of  his  schoolmates,  when  in  town,  from  Cambridge.  On  one 
of  the.se  latter  occasions  he  obtained  the  appellation  of  Gmj, 
by  which  he  was  always  called  among  them;  but  of  which 
few  of  his  late  friends  heard  till  after  his  death.  "  In  the 
first  year  of  his  clerkship,"  says  Mr.  Le  Grice,  in  the  com- 
munication with  which  he  favoured  me,  "  Lamb  spent  the 
evening  of  the  5th  November  with  some  of  his  former  school- 
fellows, who,  being  amused  with  the  particularly  large  and 
flapping  brim  of  his  round  hat,  pinned  it  up  on  the  sides  in 
the  form  of  a  cocked-hat.     Lamb  made  no  alteration  in   it, 

♦  I  was  not  train'd  in  academic  bowers, 

And  to  those  learned  streanns  I  nothing  owe 

"Which  copious  from  those  fair  twin  founts  do  flow ; 
Mine  have  been  anythmg  but  studious  hours. 
Yet  can  I  fancy  wandering  mid  thy  towers 

Myself,  a  nursling,  Granla,  of  thy  lap  ; 

My  brow  seems  tightening  with  the  drjctor's  cap, 
And  I  walk  gown'd  :  feel  unusual  powers. 
Strange  forms  of  logic  clothe  my  admiring  speech ; 

Old  Kama's  t'host  is  busy  at  my  brain  ; 
And  my  scull  teems  with  notions  infinite. 
Be  still,  ye  reed  of  Comus,  while  I  teach 

Tniths  which  transcend  the  searching  schoolman's  vein, 
And  half  had  stagger'd  that  stout  Stagynte  ' 


16       PARENTAGE,  SCHOOLDAYS,  AND  YOUTH. 

but  walked  home  in  his  usual  sauntering  gait  towards  the 
Temple.  As  he  was  going  down  Ludgate-hill,  some  gay 
young  men,  who  seemed  not  to  have  passed  the  London 
Tavern  without  resting,  exclaimed,  '  the  veritable  Guy ! — no 
man  of  straw  !'  and  with  this  exclamation  they  took  him  up, 
making  a  chair  with  their  arms,  carried  him,  seated  him  on  a 
post  in  St.  Paul's  churchyard,  and  there  left  him.  This  story 
Lamb  told  so  seriously  that  the  truth  of  it  was  never  doubted. 
He  wore  his  three-cornered  hat  many  evenings,  and  retained 
the  name  of  Guy  ever  after.  Like  Nym,  he  quietly  sympa- 
thized in  the  fun,  and  seemed  to  say,  '  that  was  the  humour  of 
it.'  A  clergyman  of  the  city  lately  wrote  to  me,  '  I  have  no 
recollection  of  Lamb.  There  was  a  gentleman  called  Guy, 
to  whom  you  once  introduced  me,  and  with  whom  1  have  oc- 
casionally interchanged  nods  for  more  than  thirty  years ;  but 
how  is  it  that  I  never  met  Mr.  Lamb  ?  If  I  was  ever  intro- 
duced to  him,  I  wonder  that  we  never  came  in  contact  during 
my  residence  for  ten  years  in  Edmonton.'  Imagine  this  gen- 
tleman's surprise  when  I  informed  him  that  his  nods  to  Mr. 
Guy  had  been  constantly  reciprocated  by  Mr.  Lamb  !" 

During  tliese  years  Lamb's  most  frequent  companion  was 
James  White,  or  rather  Jem  White,  as  he  always  called  him. 
Lamb  always  insisted  that  for  hearty  joyous  humour,  tinged 
with  Shakspearian  fancy,  Jem  never  had  an  equal.  "  Jem 
White  !"  said  he  to  Mr.  Le  Grice,  when  they  met  for  the  last 
time,  after  many  years'  absence,  at  the  Bell  at  Edmonton,  in 
June,  1833,  "  there  never  was  his  like  !  We  never  shall  see 
such  days  as  those  in  which  Jem  flourished !"  All  that  now 
remains  of  Jem  is  the  celebration  of  the  suppers  which  he 
gave  the  young  chimney-sweepers,  in  tlie  Elia  of  his  friend, 
and  a  thin  duodecimo  volume,  which  he  published  in  1796, 
under  the  title  of  the  "  Letters  of  Sir  John  FalstafF,  with  a 
dedication  (printed  in  black  letter)  to  Master  Samuel  Ire- 
launde,"  which  those  who  knew  Lamb  at  the  time  believed 
to  be  his.  "White's  Letters,"  said  Lamb,  in  a  letter  to  a 
friend  about  this  time,  "  are  near  publication.  His  frontis- 
piece is  a  good  conceit ;  Sir  .Tohn  learning  to  dance  to  please 
Madame  Page,  in  dress  of  doublet,  &c.,  from  the  upper  half, 
and  modern  pantaloons,  with  shoes  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
from  the  lower  half,  and  the  whole  work  is  full  of  oroodlv 
quips  and  rare  fancies,  '  all  deeply  masked  like  hoar  anti- 
qiiily' —  much  superior  to  Dr.  Kendrick's  '  Falstaff's  Wed- 
ding.' "  The  work  was  neglected,  although  Lamb  exerted 
all  the  influence  he  subsequently  acquired  with  more  popular 
writers  to  obtain  for  it  favourable  notices,  as  will  be  seen 
from  various  passages  in  his  letters.     He    stuck,   however, 


PARENTAGE,  SCHOOLDAYS,  AND  YOUTH.       17 

gallantly  by  his  favourite  protege  ;  and  even  when  he  could 
little  afford  to  disburse  sixpence,  he  made  a  point  of  buying  a 
copy  of  the  book  whenever  he  discovered  one  amid  the  re- 
fuse of  a  bookseller's  stall,  and  would  present  it  to  a  friend 
in  the  hope  of  making  a  convert.  He  gave  me  one  of  these 
copies  soon  after  I  became  acquainted  with  him,  stating  that 
he  had  purchased  it  in  the  morning  for  sixpence,  and  assuring 
me  I  should  enjoy  a  rare  treat  in  the  perusal ;  but,  if  I  must 
confess  the  truth,  the  mask  of  quaintness  was  so  closely 
worn,  that  it  nearly  concealed  the  humour.  To  Lamb  it 
was,  doubtless,  vivihed  by  the  eye  and  voice  of  his  old  boon 
companion,  forming  to  him  an  undying  commentary,  without 
which  it  was  comparatively  spiritless.  Alas !  how  many 
even  of  his  own  most  delicate  fancies,  rich  as  they  are  in 
feeling  and  in  wisdom,  will  be  lost  to  those  who  have  not 
present  to  them  the  sweet  broken  accents,  and  the  half  play- 
ful, half  melancholy  smile  of  the  writer  ! 

But  if  Jem  White  was  the  companion  of  his  lighter  moods, 
the  friend  of  his  serious  thoughts  was  a  person  of  far  nobler 
powers — Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge.  It  was  his  good  fortune 
to  be  the  schoolfellow  of  that  extraordinary  man  ;  and  if  no 
particular  intimacy  had  been  formed  between  them  at  Christ's 
Hospital,  a  foundation  was  there  laid  for  a  friendship  to  which 
the  world  is  probably  indebted  for  all  that  Lamb  has  added  to 
its  sources  of  pleasure.  Junior  to  Coleridge  by  two  years, 
and  far  inferior  to  him  in  all  scholastic  acquirements.  Lamb 
had  listend  to  the  rich  discourse  of  "  the  inspired  charity-boy" 
with  a  wondering  delight,  pure  from  all  envy,  and,  it  may  be, 
enhanced  by  his  sense  of  his  own  feebleness  and  difficulty  at 
expression.  While  Coleridge  remained  at  the  University  they 
met  occasionally  on  his  visits  to  London  ;  and  when  he  left  it, 
and  came  to  town,  full  of  mantling  hopes  and  glorious  schemes. 
Lamb  became  his  admiring  disciple.  The  scene  of  these 
happy  meetings  was  a  little  public-house,  called  the  Salutation 
and  Cat,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Smithfield,  where  they  used 
to  sup,  and  remain  long  after  they  had  "heard  the  chimes  of 
midnight."  'J'here  they  discoursed  of  Bowles,  who  was  the 
god  of  Coleridge's  poetical  idolatry,  and  of  Burns  and  Cowper, 
who,  of  recent  poets,  in  that  season  of  comparative  barren- 
ness, had  made  the  deepest  impression  on  Lamb.  There 
Coleridge  talked  of  "  Fate,  freewill,  foreknowledge  absolute" 
to  one  who  desired  "  to  fmd  no  end"  of  the  golden  maze ;  and 
there  h(!  recitiul  his  early  poems  with  that  deep  sweetness  of 
intonation  which  sunk  into  the  heart  of  his  hearer.  To  these 
meetings  liamb  was  accustomed,  at  all  periods  of  his  life,  to  re- 
vert as  the  season  when  his  finer  intellects  were  quickened 
2* 


18       PARENTAGE,  SCHOOLDAYS,  AND  YOUTH. 

into  action.  Shortly  after  they  had  terminated,  with  Cole- 
ridge's departure  for  London,  he  thus  recalled  them  in  a  let- 
ter.* "  When  I  read  in  your  little  volume  the  effusion  you 
call  *  the  Sigh,'  I  think  I  hear  you  again.  I  imagine  to  myself 
the  little  smoky  room  at  the  Salutation  and  Cat,  where  we 
sat  together  through  the  winter  nights  beguiling  the  cares  of 
life  with  poetry."  This  was  early  in  1796;  and  in  1818, 
when  dedicating  his  works,  then  first  collected,  to  his  earliest 
friend,  he  thus  spoke  of  the  same  meetings.  "  Some  of  the 
sonnets,  which  shall  be  carelessly  turned  over  by  the  general 
reader,  may  happily  awaken  in  you  remembrances  which  I 
should  be  sorry  to  doubt  are  totally  extinct — the  memory  '  of 
summer  days  and  of  delightful  years,'  even  so  far  back  as 
those  old  suppers  at  our  old  inn — when  life  was  fresh,  and 
topics  exhaustless — and  you  first  kindled  in  me,  if  not  the 
power,  yet  the  love  of  poetry,  and  beauty,  and  kindliness." 
And  so  he  talked  of  these  unforgotten  hours  in  that  short  inter- 
val during  which  death  divided  them  ! 

The  warmth  of  Coleridge's  friendship  supplied  the  quicken- 
ing impulse  to  Lamb's  genius  ;  but  the  ge^e  unfolding  all  its 
nice  peculiarities  lay  ready  for  the  influence,  and  expanded 
into  forms  and  hues  of  its  own.  Lamb's  earliest  poetry  was 
not  a  faint  reflection  of  Coleridge's,  such  as  the  young  lustre 
of  original  genius  may  cast  on  a  polished  and  sensitive  mind, 
to  glow  and  tremble  for  a  season,  but  was  streaked  with  deli- 
cate yet  distinct  traits,  which  proved  it  an  emanation  from 
within.  There  was,  indeed,  little  resemblance  between  the 
two,  except  in  the  affection  which  they  bore  towards  each 
other.  Coleridge's  mind,  not  laden  as  yet  with  the  spoils  of 
all  systems  and  of  all  times,  glowed  with  the  ardour  of  un- 
controllable purpose,  and  thirsted  for  glorious  achievement  and 
universal  knowledge.  The  imagination,  which  afterward 
struggled  gloriously,  but  perhaps  vainly,  to  overmaster  the 
stupendous  clouds  of  German  philosophies,  breaking  them  into 
huge  masses,  and  tinting  them  with  heavenly  hues,  then  shone 
through  the  simple  articles  of  Unitarian  faith,  the  graceful 
architecture  of  Hartley's  theory,  and  the  well-compacted  chain 
by  which  Priestley  and  Edwards  seemed  to  bind  all  things  in 
necessary  connexion,  as  through  transparencies  of  thought; 
and,  finding  no  opposition  worthy  of  its  activity  in  this  poor 
foreground  of  the  mind,  opened  for  itself  a  bright  succession 
of  fairy  visions,  which  it  sought  to  realize  on  earth.     In  its 

*  This,  with  other  passages  T  have  interwoven  with  my  own  slender  thread 
of  narration,  are  from  lettters  which  I  have  thought  either  too  personal  for  en- 
tire publication  at  present,  or  not  of  sufficient  interest,  in  comparison  with 
Others,  to  occupy  a  portion  of  the  space  to  which  the  letters  are  limited. 


PARENTAGE,    SCHOOLDAYS,    AND    YOUTH.  19 

light,  oppression  and  force  seemed  to  vanish  like  the  phan- 
toms of  a  feverish  dream  ;  mankind  were  disposed  in  the  pic- 
turesque groups  of  universal  brotherhood  ;  and,  in  far  distance, 
the  ladder  which  Jacob  saw  in  solemn  vision  connected  earth 
■with  heaven,  '•  and  the  angels  of  God  were  ascending  and  de- 
scending upon  it."  Lamb  had  no  sympathy  with  these  radiant 
hopes,  except  as  they  were  part  of  his  friend.  He  clung  to 
the  realities  of  life  ;  to  thiiigs  nearest  to  him,  which  the  force 
of  habit  hacl  made  d^ar  ; .  and-caught  -tremblingly  hold  of  the 
pasL  He  delighted,  indeed,  to  hear  Coleridge  talk  of  the  dis- 
tant and  future  ;  to  see  the  palm-trees  wave  and  the  pyramids 
tower  in  the  long  perspective  of  his  style  ;  and  to  catch  the 
prophetic  notes  of  a  universal  harmony  trembling  in  his  voice 
but  the  pleasure  was  only  that  of  admiration  unalloyed  by 
envy,  and  of  the  generous  pride  of  friendship.  The  tendency 
of  his  mind  to  detect  the  beautiful  and  good  in  surrounding 
things,  to  nestle  rather  than  to  roam,  was  cherished  by  all  the 
circumstances  of  his  boyish  days.  He  had  become  familiar 
with  the  vestiges  of  antiquity,  both  in  his  school  and  in  his 
home  of  the  Temple  ;  and  these  became  dear  to  him  in  his 
serious  and  affectionate  childhood.  But,  perhaps,  more  even 
than  those  external  associations,  the  situation  of  his  parents, 
as  it  was  elevated  and  graced  by  their  character,  moulded  his 
young  thoughts  to  the  holy  habit  of  a  liberal  obedience  and 
unaspiring  self-respect,  which  led  rather  to  the  embellishment 
of  what  w  as  near  than  to  the  creation  of  visionary  forms.  He 
saw  at  home  the  daily  beauty  of  a  cheerful  submission  to  a 
state  bordering  on  the  servile  ;  he  looked  upward  to  his  father's 
master,  and  the  old  benchers  who  walked  with  him  on  the 
stately  terrace,  with  a  modest  erectness  of  mind  ;  and  he  saw 
in  his  own  humble  home  how  well  the  decencies  of  life  could 
be  maintained  on  slender  means  by  the  exercise  of  generous 
principle.  Another  circumstance,  akin  to  these,  tended  also 
to  impart  a  tinge  of  venerableness  to  his  early  musings.  His 
maternal  grandmother  was  for  many  years  housekeeper  in  the 
old  and  wealthy  family  of  the  Plumers  of  Hertfordshire,  by 
whom  she  was  held  in  true  esteem  ;  and  his  visits  to  their  an- 
cient mansion,  where  he  had  the  free  range  of  every  apart- 
ment, gallery,  and  terraced  walk,  gave  him  "  a  peep  at  the  con- 
trasting accidents  of  a  great  fortune,"  and  an  alliance  with  that 
gentility  of  soul  which  to  appreciate  is  to  share.  He  has 
beautifully  recorded  his  own  recollections  of  this  place  in  the 

essay  entitled,   "  Blakesmoor   in   H shire,"  in  which  he 

modestly  vindicates  his  claim  to  partake  in  the  associations  of 
ancestry  not  his  own,  and  shows  the  true  value  ofliigh  lineage 
by  detecting  the  spirit  of  nobleness  which  breathes  around  it. 


20       PARENTAGE,  SCHOOLDAYS,  AND  YOUTH. 


s)" 


for  the  enkindling  of  generous  affections,  not  only  in  those 
who  may  boast  of  its  possession,  but  in  all  who  can  feel  its 
ijifluences. 

IVhile  the  bias  of  the  minds  of  Coleridge  and  Lamb  thus 
essentially  differed,  it  is  singular  that  their  opinions  on  reli- 
gion, and  on  those  philosophical  questions  which  border  on 
religious  belief,  and  receive  their  colour  from  it,  agreed,  al- 
though probably  derived  from  various  sourcesT*,  Both  were 
Unitarians,  ardent  admirers  of  the  writings  and  character  of 
Dr.  Priestley,  and  both  believers  in  necessity,  according  to 
Priestley's  exposition,  and  in  the  mference  which  he  drew 
from  that  doctrine  respecting  moral  responsibility  and  the 
ultimate  destiny  of  the  human  race.  The  adoption  of  this 
creed  arose  in  Lamb  from  the  accident  of  education  ;  he  was 
brought  up  to  receive  and  love  it ;  and  attended,  when  cir- 
cumstances permitted,  at  the  chapel  at  Hackney,  of  which  Mr. 
Belsham,  afterward  of  Essex-street,  was  then  the  minister. 
It  is  remarkable  that  another  of  Lamb's  most  intimate  friends, 
in  whose  conversation,  next  to  that  of  Coleridge,  he  most  de- 
lighted, Mr.  Hazlitt,  with  whom  he  became  acquainted  at  a 
subsequent  time,  and  who  came  from  a  distant  part  of  the 
country,  was  educated  in  the  same  faith.  With  Coleridge, 
whose  early  impressions  were  derived  from  the  rites  and  ser- 
vices of  the  Church  of  England,  Unitarianism  was  the  result 
of  a  strong  conviction  ;  so  strong  that,  with  all  the  ardour  of  a 
convert,  he  sought  to  win  proselytes  to  his  chosen  creed,  and 
purposed  to  spend  his  days  in  preaching  it.  Neither  of  these 
young  men,  however,  long  continued  to  profess  it.  Lamb,  in 
his  mature  life,  rarely  alluded  to  matters  of  religious  doctrine  ; 
and,  when  he  did  so,  evinced  no  sympathy  with  the  professors 
of  his  once-loved  creed.  Hazlitt  wrote  of  his  father,  who  was 
a  Unitarian  minister  at  Wem,  with  honouring  affection ;  and 
of  his  dissenting  associates  with  respect,  but  he  had  obviously 
ceased  to  think  or  feel  with  them ;  and  Coleridge's  Remains 
indicate,  what  was  well  known  to  all  who  enjoyed  the  privi- 
lege of  his  conversation,  that  he  not  only  reverted  to  a  belief 
in  the  Trinitarian  mysteries,  but  that  he  was  accustomed  to 
express  as  much  distaste  for  Unitarianism,  and  for  the  spirit 
of  its  more  active  advocates,  as  the  benignity  of  his  nature 
would  allow  him  to  feel  for  any  human  opinion  honestly  cher- 
ished. Perhaps  this  solitary  approach  to  intolerance  in  the 
universality  of  Coleridge's  mind  arose  from  the  disapproval 
with  which  he  might  justly  regard  his  own  pride  of  under- 
standing, as  excited  in  defence  of  the  doctrines  he  had  adopted. 
To  hi  in  there  was  much  of  devotional  thought  to  be  violated, 
many  reverential  associations,  intertwined  with  the  moral  being, 


PARENTAGE,    SCHOOLDAYS,    AND    YOUTH.  21 

to  be  rent  away  in  the  struggle  of  the  intellect  to  grasp  the 
doctrines  which  were  alien  to  its  nurture.  But  to  Lamb  these 
formed  the  simple  creed  of  his  childhood  ;  and  slender  and 
barren  as  they  seem  to  those  who  are  united  in  religious 
sympathy  with  the  great  body  of  their  fellow-countrymen,  they 
sufficed  for  affections  which  had  so  strong  a  tendency  to  find 
out  resting-places  for  themselves  as  his.  Those  who  only 
knew  him  in  his  latter  days,  and  who  feel  that  if  ever  the  spirit 
of  Christianity  breathed  through  a  human  life  it  breathed  in 
his,  will  nevertheless  trace  with  surprise  the  extraordinary 
vividness  of  impressions  directly  religious,  and  the  self-jeal- 
ousy with  which  he  watched  the  cares  and  distractions  of  the 
world,  which  might  efface  them  in  his  first  letters.  If  in  a 
life  of  ungenial  toil,  diversified  with  frequent  sorrow,  the  train 
of  these  solemn  meditations  was  broken  ;  if  he  was  led,  in  the 
distractions  and  labours  of  his  course,  to  cleave  more  closely 
to  surrounding  objects  than  those  early  aspirations  promised  ; 
if,  in  his  cravings  after  immediate  sympathy,  he  rather  sought 
to  perpetuate  the  social  circle  which  he  charmed,  than  to  ex- 
patiate in  scenes  of  untried  being ;  his  pious  feelings  were 
only  diverted,  not  destroyed.  The  stream  glided  still,  the 
under  current  of  thought,  sometimes  breaking  out  in  sallies 
which  strangers  did  not  understand,  but  always  feeding  and 
nourishing  the  most  exquisite  sweetness  of  disposition,  and  the 
most  unobtrusive  proofs  of  self-denying  love. 

While  Lamb  was  enjoying  habits  of  the  closest  intimacy 
with  Coleridge  in  London,  he  was  introduced  by  him  to  a 
young  poet  whose  name  has  often  been  associated  with  his — 
Charles  Lloyd — the  son  of  a  wealthy  banker  at  Birmingham, 
who  had  recently  cast  off  the  trammels  of  the  Society  of 
Friends,  and,  smitten  with  the  love  of  poetry,  had  become  a 
student  at  the  University  of  Cambridge.  There  he  had  been 
attached  to  Coleridge  by  the  fascination  of  his  discourse  ;  and, 
having  been  admitted  to  his  regard,  was  introduced  by  him  to 
Lamb.  Lloyd  was  endeared  both  to  Lamb  and  Coleridge  by 
a  very  amiable  disposition  and  a  pensive  cast  of  thought;  but 
his  intellect  bore  little  resemblance  to  that  of  either.  He 
wrote,  indeed,  pleasing  verses  and  with  great  facility — a  facil- 
ity fatal  to  excellence  ;  but  his  mind  was  chiefly  remarkable 
for  the  fine  power  of  analysis  which  distinguishes  his  "  Lon- 
don," and  other  of  his  later  compositions.  In  this  power  of 
discriminating  and  distinguishing,  carried  to  a  pitch  almost 
of  painfulness,  Lloyd  has  scarcely  been  equalled  ;  and  his 
poems,  though  rugged  in  point  of  versification,  will  be  found, 
by  those  who  will  read  them  with  the  calm  attention  they  re- 
quire, replete  with  critical  and  moral  suggestions  of  the  high- 


2S  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

est  value.  He  and  Coleridge  were  devoted  wholly  to  literary 
pursuits  ;  while  Lamb's  days  were  given  to  accounts,  and  only 
at  snatches  of  time  was  he  able  to  cultivate  the  faculty  of 
which  the  society  of  Coleridge  had  made  him  imperfectly  con- 
scious. 

Lamb's  first  compositions  were  in  verse,  produced  slowly, 
at  long  intervals,  and  with  self-distrust  which  the  encourage- 
ments of  Coleridge  could  not  subdue.  With  the  exception  of 
a  sonnet  to  Mrs.  Siddons,  whose  acting,  especially  in  the 
character  of  Lady  Randolph,  had  made  a  deep  impression 
upon  him,  they  were  exclusively  personal.  The  longest  and 
most  elaborate  is  that  beautiful  piece  of  blank  verse  entitled 
"  The  Grandame,"  in  which  he  so  affectionately  celebrates 
the  virtues  of  the  "  antique  world"  of  the  aged  housekeeper  of 
Mr.  Plumer.  A  youthful  passion,  which  lasted  only  a  few 
months,  and  which  he  afterward  attempted  to  regard  lightly 
as  a  folly  past,  inspired  a  few  sonnets  of  very  delicate  feeling 
and  exquisite  music.  On  the  death  of  his  parents  he  felt  him- 
self called  upon  by  duty  to  repay  to  his  sister  the  solicitude 
with  which  she  had  watched  over  his  infancy  ;  and  well  indeed 
he  performed  it !  To  her,  from  the  age  of  twenty-one,  he  de- 
voted his  existence  ;  seeking  thenceforth  no  connexion  which 
could  interfere  with  her  supremacy  in  his  affections,  or  impair 
his  ability  to  sustain  and  to  comfort  her. 


CHAPTER  n. 

[1796.] 
Letters  to  Coleridge. 

In  the  year  1796,  Coleridge,  having  married  and  relin- 
quished his  splendid  dream  of  emigration,  was  resident  at 
Bristol ;  and  Lamb,  who  had  left  the  Temple,  and  lived  with 
his  father,  then  sinking  into  dotage,  felt  his  absence  from 
London  bitterly,  and  sought  a  correspondence  with  him  as, 
almost,  his  only  comfort.  "  In  your  absence,"  he  writes,  in 
one  of  the  earliest  of  his  letters,*  "  I  feel  a  stupor  which 
makes  me  indifferent  to  the  hopes  and  fears  of  this  life.  I 
sometimes  wish  to  induce  a  religious  turn  of  mind  ;  but  habits 

*  These  and  other  passages  are  extracted  from  letters  which  are  either  too 
personal  or  not  sufficiently  interesting  for  entire  publication. 


I 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  23 

are  stubborn  things,  and  my  religious  fervours  are  confined  to 
some  fleeting  moments  of  occasional  solitary  devotion.  A 
correspondence  opening  with  you  has  roused  me  a  little  from 
my  lethargy,  and  made  me  conscious  of  existence.  Indulge 
me  in  it !  1  will  not  be  very  troublesome."  And  again  a  few 
days  after :  "  You  are  the  only  correspondent,  and,  I  might 
add,  the  only  friend  I  have  in  the  world.  I  go  nowhere,  and 
have  no  acquaintance.  Slow  of  speech  and  reserved  of  man- 
ners, no  one  seeks  or  cares  for  my  society,  and  I  am  left  alone. 
Coleridge,  I  devoutly  wish  that  fortune,  which  has  made  sport 
with  you  so  long,  may  play  one  prank  more,  throw  you  into 
lyondon,  or  some  spot  near  it,  and  there  snugify  you  for  life. 
'Tis  a  selfish  but  natural  wish  for  me,  cast  on  life's  plain 
friendless."  These  appeals,  it  may  well  be  believed,  were 
not  made  in  vain  to  one  who  delighted  in  the  lavish  communi- 
cation of  the  riches  of  his  own  mind  even  to  strangers  ;  but 
none  of  the  letters  of  Coleridge  to  Lamb  have  been  preserved. 
He  had  just  published  his  "  Religious  Musings,"  and  the 
glittering  enthusiasm  of  its  language  excited  Lamb's  pious  feel- 
ings, almost  to  a  degree  of  pain.  "  I  dare  not,"  says  he  of 
this  poem,  "  criticise  it.  I  like  not  to  select  any  part  where 
all  is  excellent.  I  can  only  admire  and  thank  you  for  it,  in  the 
name  of  a  lover  of  true  poetry — 

'  Believe  thou,  oh  my  soul, 
Life  is  a  vision  shadowy  of  truth  ; 
And  pain,  and  anguish,  and  the  wornny  grave, 
Shapes  of  a  dream.' 

I  thank  you  for  these  lines,  in  the  name  of  a  necessitarian." 
To  Priestley  Lamb  repeatedly  alludes  as  to  the  object  of  their 
common  admiration.  "  In  reading  your  Religious  Musings," 
says  he,  "  I  have  felt  a  transient  superiority  over  you :  I  have 
seen  Priestley.  I  love  to  see  his  name  repeated  in  your 
writings  ;  I  love  and  honour  him  almost  profanely."*  The 
same  ferver  glows  in  the  sectarian  piety  of  the  following  letter 
addressed  to  Coleridge,  when  fascinated  with  the  idea  of  a 
cottage  life. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

*'  Coleridge,  I  feel  myself  much  your  debtor  for  that  spirit  of 
confidence  and  friendship  which  dictated  your  ^st  letter.  May 
your  soul  find  peace  at  last  in  your  cottage  liie !    I  only  wish 

*  He  probably  refers  to  the  following  lines  in  the  Religious  Musings  : — 

"  So  Priestley,  their  patriot,  and  saint,  and  sage, 
Him,  full  of  years,  from  his  loved  native  land. 
Statesmen  bloodstain'd,  and  priests  idolatrous, 
Drdve  with  vain  hate.     Calm,  pitying,  he  retum'd, 
And  mused  expectant  on  those  promised  years  !" 


24  LETTERS  TO    COLERIDGE. 

you  were  hut  settled.     Do  continue  to  write  to  me.     I  read 
your  letters  with  my  sister,  and  they  gave  us  both  abundance 
of  delight.     Especially  they  please  us  too,  when  you  talk  in  a 
religious  strain  ;    not  but  we  are  offended  occasionally  with  a 
certain  freedom  of  expression,  a  certain  air  of  mysticism,  more 
consonant  to  the  conceits  of  pagan  philosophy  than  consistent 
with  humility  of  genuine  piety.     To  instance  now  in  your  last 
letter,  you  say,  '  it  is  by  the  press  that  God  hath  given  finite 
spirits,  both  evil  and  good  (I  suppose  you  mean  simply  bad 
men  and  good  men),  a  portion  as  it  were  of  his  Omnipres- 
ence !'    Now,  high  as  the  human  intellect  comparatively  will 
soar,  and  wide  as  its  influence,  malign  or  salutary,  can  extend, 
is  there  not,  Coleridge,  a  distance  between  the  Divine  mind 
and  it  which  makes   such  language   blasphemy?    Again,  in 
your  first  fine  consolatory  epistle  you  say,  '  you  are  a  tempo- 
rary sharer  in  human  misery,  that  you  may  be  an  eternal  par- 
taker of  the  Divine  Nature.'    What  more  than  this  do  those  men 
say  who  are  for  exalting  the  man  Christ  Jesus  into  the  sec- 
ond person  of  an  unknown  Trinity,  men,  whom  you  or  I  scru- 
ple not  to  call  idolators  ?     Man,  full  of  imperfections,  at  best, 
and  subject  to  wants  which  momentarily  remind  him  of  de- 
pendance  ;  man,  a  weak  and  ignorant  being,  '  servile'  from  his 
birth  '  to  all  the  skiey  influences,'  with  eyes  sometimes  open 
to  discern  the  right  path,  but  a  head  generally  too  dizzy  to 
pursue  it ;    man,  in  ihe  pride  of   speculation,  forgetting  his 
nature,  and  hailing  in  himself  the  future  God,  must  make  the 
angels  laugh.     Be  not  angry  with  me,  Coleridge ;  I  wish  not 
to  cavil  ;j  I  know  I  cannot  instruct  you  ;  I  only  wish  to  remind 
you  of  that  humility  which  best  becometh  the  Christian  charac- 
ter.    God  in  the  New  Testament  [our  best  guide)  is  repre- 
sented to  us  in  the  kind,  condescending,  amiable,  familiar  light 
of  a  parent :  and  in  my  poor  mind  'tis  best  for  us  so  to  consider 
of  him,  as  our  heavenly  father,  and  our  best  friend,  without  in- 
dulging too  bold  conceptions  of  his  nature.     Let  us  learn  to 
think  humbly  of  ourselves,  and  rejoice  in  the  appellation  of 
*  dear  children,'  '  brethren,'  and  '  coheirs  with  Christ  of  tbe 
promises,'  seeking  to  know  no  further. 

"  I  am  not  insensible,  indeed  I  am  not,  of  the  value  of  that 
first  letter  of  yours,  and  I  shall  find  reason  to  thank  you  for  it 
again  and  again  long  after  that  blemish  in  it  is  forgotten.  It 
will  be  a  fine  lesson  of  comfort  to  us  whenever  we  read  it ; 
and  read  it  we  often  shall,  Mary  and  I. 

"  Accept  our  loves  and  best  kind  wishes  for  the  welfare  of 
yourself,  and  wife,  and  little  one.  Nor  let  me  forget  to  wish 
you  joy  on  your  birtliday  so  lately  past ;  I  thought  you  had 
been  older.     My  kind  thanks  and  remembrances  to  Lloyd. 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  25 

"  God  love  us  all,  and  may  he  continue  lo  be  the  father  and 
the  friend  of  the  whole  human  race  ! 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"  Sunday  evening." 

The  next  letter,  commencing  in  a  similar  strain,  diverges 
to  literary  topics,  and  especially  alludes  to  "  Walton's  Angler," 
a  book  which  Lamb  always  loved  as  it  were  a  living  friend. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  My  dear  friend,  I  am  not  ignorant  that  to  be  a  partaker  of 
the  Divine  Nature  is  a  phrase  to  be  met  with  in  Scripture  ;  I 
am  only  apprehensive  lest  we  in  these  latter  days,  tinctured 
(some  of  us,  perhaps,  pretty  deeply)  with  mystical  notions 
and  the  pride  of  metaphysics,  might  be  apt  to  affix  to  such 
phrases  a  meaning  which  the  primitive  users  of  them,  the 
simple  fisher  of  Galilee  for  instance,  never  intended  to  convey. 
With  that  other  part  of  your  apology  I  am  not  quite  so  well 
satisfied.  You  seem  to  me  to  have  been  straining  your  com- 
paring faculties  to  bring  together  things  infinitely  distant  and 
unlike  ;  the  feeble,  narrow-sphered  operations  of  the  human 
intellect ;  and  the  everywhere  diffused  mind  of  the  Deity, 
the  peerless  wisdom  of  Jehovah.  Even  the  expression  ap- 
pears to  me  inaccurate — portion  of  omnipresence — omnipres- 
ence is  an  attribute  whose  very  essence  is  entireness.  How 
can  omnipresence  be  affirmed  of  anything  in  part?  But 
enough  of  this  spirit  of  disputaciousness.  Let  us  attend  to 
the  proper  business  of  human  life,  and  talk  a  little  together 
respecting  our  domestic  concerns.  Do  you  continue  to  make 
me  acquainted  with  what  you  are  doing,  and  how  soon  you 
are  likely  to  be  settled  once  for  all? 

"  Have  you  seen  Bowles's  new  poem  on  '  Hope?'  What 
character  does  it  bear  ?  Has  he  exhausted  his  stores  of  ten- 
der plaintiveness  ?  or  is  he  the  same  in  this  last  as  in  all  his 
former  pieces  ?  The  duties  of  the  day  call  me  off  from  this 
pleasant  intercourse  with  my  friend  ;  so  for  the  present  adieu 
Now  for  the  truant  borrowing  of  a  few  minutes  from  business. 
Have  you  met  with  a  new  poem  called  the  '  Pursuits  of  liit- 
erature  ?'  From  the  extracts  in  the  '  British  Review'  I  judge 
it  to  be  a  very  humorous  thing  ;  in  particular  I  remember  whaf 
I  thought  a  very  happy  character  of  Dr.  Darwin's  pootr\ . 
Among  all  your  quaint  readings,  did  you  ever  light  upon  '  Wal- 
ton's Complete  Angler?'  I  asked  you  the  question  once  bo- 
fore  ;  it  breathes  the  very  spirit  of  innocence,  purity,  an-' 
simplicity  of  heart ;  there  are  many  choice,  old  verses  intei 
spersed  in  it ;  it  would  sweeten  a  man's  temper  at  any  tim-- 

Vol.  T.~3  B 


26  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

to  read  it ;  it  would  Christianize  every  discordant  angry  pas- 
sion ;  pray  make  yourself  acquainted  with  it. 

"  When  will  Southey  he  delivered  of  his  new  epic  ?  Madoc, 
I  think,  is  to  be  the  name  of  it,  though  that  is  a  name  not  fa- 
miliar to  my  ears.  What  progress  do  you  make  in  your 
hymns  ?  What  '  Review'  are  you  connected  with  ?  if  with 
any,  why  do  you  delay  to  notice  White's  book  ?  You  are 
justly  offended  at  its  profaneness,  but  surely  you  have  under- 
valued its  wit,  or  you  would  have  been  more  loud  in  its  praises. 
Do  not  you  think  that  in  Slender's  death  and  madness  there  is 
most  exquisite  humour  mingled  with  tenderness,  that  is  irre- 
sistible, truly  Shakspearian  ?  Be  more  full  in  your  mention  of 
it.  Poor  fellow,  he  has  (very  undeservedly)  lost  by  it ;  nor  do 
I  see  that  it  is  likely  ever  to  reimburse  him  the  charge  of 
printing,  <fec.  Give  it  a  lift  if  you  can.  I  am  just  now  won- 
dering whether  you  will  ever  come  to  town  again,  Coleridge  ; 
'tis  among  the  things  I  dare  not  hope,  but  can't  help  wishing. 
For  myself,  I  can  live  in  the  midst  of  town  luxury  and  super- 
fluity and  not  long  for  them  ;  and  I  can't  see  why  your  chil- 
dren might  not  hereafter  do  the  same.  Remember  you  are 
not  in  Arcadia  when  you  are  in  the  west  of  England,  and  they 
may  catch  infection  from  the  world  without  visiting  the  me- 
tropolis. But  you  seem  to  have  set  your  heart  upon  this  same 
cottage  plan,  and  God  prosper  you  in  the  experiment !  I  am 
at  a  loss  for  more  to  write  about,  so  'tis  as  well  that  I  am  ar- 
rived at  the  bottom  of  my  paper. 

"  God  love  you,  Coleridge ;  our  best  loves  and  tenderest 
wishes  await  on  you,  your  Sarah,  and  your  little  one. 

"C.  L." 

Having   been   encouraged  by  Coleridge   to    entertain  the 
thought  of  publishing  his  verses,  he  submitted  the  poem  called 
*  The  Grandame"  to  his  friend  with  the  following  letter  : — 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Monday  night. 
"  Unfurnished  at  present  with  any  sheet-filling  subject,  I 
shall  continue  my  letter  gradually  and  journal-wise.  My 
second  thoughts  entirely  coincide  with  your  thoughts  on 
'  Joan  of  Arc,'  and  I  can  only  wonder  at  my  childish  judgment 
which  overlooked  the  first  book  and  could  prefer  the  ninth ; 
not  that  I  was  insensible  to  the  soberer  beauties  of  the  former, 
but  the  latter  caught  me  with  its  glare  of  magic  ;  the  former, 
however,  left  a  more  pleasing  general  recollection  in  my  mind. 
Let  me  add,  the  first  book  was  the  favourite  of  my  sister  ;  and 
/  now,  with  Joan,  often  '  think  on  Domremi  and  the  fields  of 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  27 

Arc'  I  must  not  pass  over  without  acknowledging  my  obli- 
gations to  your  full  and  satisfactory  account  of  personifications. 
I  have  read  it  again  and  again,  and  it  will  be  a  guide  to  my 
future  taste.  Perhaps  [  had  estimated  Southey's  merits  too 
much  by  number,  weight,  and  measure.  I  now  agree  com- 
pletely and  entirely  in  your  opinion  of  the  genius  of  Souihey. 
Your  own  image  of  melancholy  is  illustrative  of  what  you 
teach,  and  in  itself  masterly.  I  conjecture  it  is  disbranched 
from  one  of  your  embryo  '  hymns.'  When  they  are  mature 
for  birth  (were  I  you)  I  should  print  'em  in  one  separate  vol- 
ume, with  '  Religious  Musings,'  and  your  part  of  the  '  Joan  of 
Arc'  Birds  of  the  same  soaring  wing  should  hold  on  their 
flight  in  company.  Once  for  all  (and  by  renewing  the  subject 
you  will  only  renew  in  me  the  condemnation  of  Tantalus),  I 
hope  to  be  able  to  pay  you  a  visit  (if  you  are  then  in  Bristol) 
some  time  in  the  latter  end  of  August  or  beginning  of  Septem- 
ber, for  a  week  or  fortnight;  before  that  time,  office  business 
puts  an  absolute  veto  on  my  corning.  Of  the  blank  verses  I 
spoke  of,  the  following  lines  are  the  only  tolerable  complete 
ones  I  have  written  out  of  not  more  than  one  hundred  and  fifty. 
That  I  get  on  so  slowly  you  may  fairly  impute  to  want  of 
practice  in  composition,  when  I  declare  to  you  that  (the  few 
verses  which  you  have  seen  excepted)  I  have  not  written  fifty 
lines  since  I  left  school,  it  may  not  be  amiss  to  remark  that 
Miy  grandmother  (on  whom  the  verses  are  written)  lived 
housekeeper  in  a  family  the  fiity  or  sixty  last  years  of  her 
life  ;  that  she  was  a  woman  of  exemplary  })iety  and  goodness  ; 
and  for  many  years  before  her  death  was  terribly  afflicted 
with  a  cancer  in  her  breast,  which  she  bore  with  true  Chris- 
tian patience.  You  may  think  that  I  have  not  kept  enough 
apart  the  ideas  of  her  heavenly  and  her  earthly  master,  but 
recollect  I  have  designedly  given  in  to  her  own  way  of  feel- 
ing; and  if  she  had  a  failing,  'twas  that  she  respected  her 
master's  family  too  much,  not  reverenced  her  Maker  too  little. 
'J'he  lines  begin  imperfectly,  as  I  may  probably  connect  'em 
if  1  finish  at  all;  and  if  1  do,  Biggs  shall  print  'em  in  a  more 
economical  way  than  you  yours,  for  (sonnets  and  all)  they 
won't  make  a  thousand  lines  as  I  propose  completing  'em, 
md  the  substance  must  be  wiredrawn. 

The  following  letter,  written  at  intervals,  will  give  an  m- 
sight  into  I^amb's  spirit  at  this  time,  in  its  lighter  and  gayer 
moods.  It  would  seem  that  his  acquaintance  with  the  old 
English  dramatists  had  just  commenced  with  Beaumont  and 
Fletcher,  and  Massinger. 

B2 


28  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

TO    MR.  COLERIDGE. 

"  Tuesday  evening. 
"  To  your  list  of  illustrative  personifications,  into  which 
a  fine  imagination  enters,  I  will  take  leave  to  add  the  follow- 
ing from  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's  '  Wife  for  a  Month;' 'tis 
the  conclusion  of  a  description  of  a  seafight : — '  The  game 
of  death  was  never  played  so  nobly  ;  the  meager  thief  grew 
wanton  in  his  mischiefs,  and  his  shrunk  hollow  eyes  smiled 
on  his  ruins.'  'J'here  is  fancy  in  these  of  a  lower  order,  from 
*  Bonduca  :'  '  Then  did  I  see  these  valiant  men  of  Britain, 
like  boding  owls,  creep  into  todds  of  ivy,  and  hoot  their  fears 
to  one  another  nightly.'  Not  that  it  is  a  personification  ;  only 
it  just  caught  my  eye  in  a  little  extract-book  I  keep,  which  is 
full  of  quotations  from  B.  and  F.  in  particular,  in  which  au- 
thors I  can't  help  thinking  there  is  a  greater  richness  of 
poetical  fancy  than  in  any  one,  Shakspeare  excepted.  Are 
you  acquainted  with  Massinger^  At  a  hazard  I  will  trouble 
you  with  a  passage  from  a  play  of  his  called  '  A  Very  Wo- 
man.' The  lines  are  spoken  by  a  lover  (disguised)  to  his 
faithless  mistress.  You  will  remark  the  fine  effect  of  the 
double  endings.  You  will  by  your  ear  distinguish  the  lines, 
for  I  write  'em  as  prose.  '  Not  far  from  where  my  father  lives, 
a  lady,  a  neighbour  by,  blessed  with  as  great  a  beauty  as  na- 
ture durst  bestow  without  undoings  dwelt,  and  most  happily, 
as  I  thought  then,  and  blessed  the  house  a  thousand  times  she 
dwelt  in.  This  beauty,  in  the  blossom  of  my  youth,  when 
my  first  fire  knew  no  adulterate  incense^  nor  I  no  way  to  flat- 
ter but  my  fondness ;  in  all  the  bravery  my  friends  could  show 
me,  in  all  the  faith  my  innocence  could  give  me,  in  the  best 
language  my  true  tongue  could  tell  me,  and  all  the  broken 
sighs  my  sick  heart  lend  me,  I  sued  and  served ;  long  did  I 
serve  this  lady,  long  was  my  travail,  long  my  trade  to  win  her; 
with  all  the  duty  of  my  soul  I  servkd  her.'  '  Then  she  must 
love.'  'She  did,  but  never  me  :  she  could  not  love  me  ;  she 
would  not  love,  she  hated — more,  she  scorned  me ;  and  in  so 
poor  and  base  a  way  abused  mc  for  all  my  services,  for  all  my 
bounties,  so  bold  neglects  flung  on  me.'  '  What  out  of  love, 
and  worthy  love,  I  gave  her  (shame  to  her  most  unworthy 
mind),  to  fools,  to  girls,  to  fiddlers  and  her  boys  she  flung,  all 
ill  disdain  of  me.'  One  more  passage  strikes  my  eye  from 
B.  and  F.'s  '  Palamon  and  Arcite.'  One  of 'em  complains  in 
prison  :  '  This  is  all  our  world  ;  we  shall  know  nothing  here 
but  one  another  ;  hear  nothing  but  the  clock  that  tells  us  our 
woes  ;  the  vine  shall  grow,  but  we  shall  never  see  it,'  &;c. 
Is  not  the  last  circumstance  exquisite  1  I  mean  not  to  lay 
myself  open  by  saying  they  exceed  Milton,  and  perhaps  Col- 


LETTERS    To    COLERIDGE.  29 

lins,  in  sublimity.  But  don't  you  conceive  all  poet's,  after 
Shakspeare,  yield  to  'em  in  variety  of  genius  1  Massinger 
treads  close  on  their  heels  ;  but  you  arc  most  probably  as 
"well  acquainted  with  his  w^ritings  as  your  humble  servant. 
My  quotations,  in  that  case,  will  only  serve  to  expose  my 
barrenness  of  matter.  Southey,  in  simplicity  and  tenderness, 
is  excelled  decidedly  only,  I  think,  by  Beaumont  and  F.  in  his 
'Maid's  Tragedy,'  and  some  parts  of  '  Philaster'  in  particular, 
and  elsewhere,  occasionally ;  and  perhaps  by  Cowper,  in  his 
'Crazy  Kate,' and  in  parts  of  his  translation;  such  ^i-  the 
speeches  of  Hecuba  and  Andromache.  I  long  to  know  your 
opinion  of  that  translation.  The  Odyssey  especially  is  surely 
very  Homeric.  What  nobler  than  the  appearance  of  Phoebus 
at  the  beginning  of  the  Iliad,  the  lines  ending  with  '  Dread 
sounding,  bounding  on  the  silver  bow  !' 

*'  I  beg  you  will  give  me  your  opinion  of  the  translation  ;  it 
afforded  me  high  pleasure.  As  curious  a  specimen  of  trans- 
lation as  ever  fell  into  my  hands,  is  a  young  man's  in  our  of- 
fice, of  a  French  novel.  What  in  the  original  was  literally 
'  amiable  delusions  of  the  fancy,'  he  proposed  to  render  '  the 
fair  frauds  of  the  imagination.'  I  had  much  trouble  in  licking 
the  book  into  any  meaning  at  all.  Yet  did  the  knave  clear 
fifty  or  sixty  pounds  by  subscription  and  selling  the  copy- 
right. The  book  itself  not  a  week's  work  !  To-day's  portion 
of  my  journalizing  epistle  has  been  very  dull  and  poverty- 
stricken.     I  will  here  end." 

"  Tuesday  night. 

"  I  have  been  drinking  egg  hot  and  smoking  Oronooko, 
(associating  circumstances,  which  ever  forcibly  recall  to  my 
mind  our  evenings  and  nights  at  the  Salutation),  my  eyes  and 
brain  are  heavy  and  asleep,  but  my  heart  is  awake  ;  and  if 
■words  came  as  ready  as  ideas,  and  ideas  as  feelings,  I  could 
say  ten  hundred  kind  things.  Coleridge,  you  know  not  my 
supreme  happiness  at  having  one  on  earth  (though  counties 
separate  us)  whom  I  can  call  a  friend.  Remember  you  those 
tender  lines  of  Logan  ? — 

'  Our  broken  friendships  we  deplore, 
And  loves  of  youth  that  are  no  more; 
No  after  friendships  e'er  can  raise 
Th'  endearments  of  our  early  days, 
And  ne'er  the  heart  such  fondness  prove, 
As  when  we  first  began  to  love.' 

"  I  am  writing  at  random,  and  half-tipsy,  what  you  may  not 
equally  understand,  as  you  will  be  sober  when  you  read  it,  but 
WT/  sober  and  my  half-tipsy  hours  you  are  alike  a  sharer  in. 
Good-night. 
3* 


30  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

'Then  up  rose  our  bard  like  a  prophet  in  drink, 
Craigdoroch,  thou'lt  soar  when  creation  shall  sink.' — Burns." 

"  Thursday. 
"  I  am  now  in  high  hopes  to  be  able  to  visit  you,  if  perfect- 
ly convenient  on  your  part,  by  the  end  of  next  month — per- 
haps the  last  week  or  fortnight  in  July.  A  change  of  scene 
and  a  change  of  faces  would  do  me  good,  even  if  that  scene 
were  not  to  be  Bristol,  and  those  faces  Coleridge's  and  his 
friends'!  In  the  words  of  Terence,  a  little  altered,  *  Taedet 
me  hujus  qiiotidiani  mundi.''  1  am  heartily  sick  of  the  every- 
day scenes  of  life.  1  shall  half  wish  you  unmarried  (don't 
show  this  to  Mrs.  C.)  for  one  evening  only,  to  have  the  pleas- 
ure of  smoking  with  you,  and  drinking  egg  hot  in  some  little 
smoky  room  in  a  pothouse,  for  I  know  not  yet  how  I  shall  like 
you  in  a  decent  room,  and  looking  quite  happy.  My  best 
love  and  respects  to  Sara  notwithstanding. 

"  Yours  sincerely, 

"Charles  Lamb." 

A  proposal  by  Coleridge  to  print  Lamb's  poems  with  a  new 
edition  of  his  own  (an  association  in  which  Lloyd  was  ulti- 
mately included)  occasioned  reciprocal  communications  of 
each  other's  verses,  and  many  questions  of  small  alterations 
suggested  and  argued  on  both  sides.  I  have  thought  it  better 
to  omit  much  of  this  verbal  criticism,  which,  not  very  interest- 
ing in  itself,  is  unintelligible  without  a  contemporary  reference 
to  the  poems  which  are  its  subject.  The  next  letter  was 
written  on  hearing  of  Coleridge  being  afflicted  with  a  painful 
disease. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  My  brother,  my  friend — I  am  distressed  for  you,  believe 
me  I  am  ;  not  so  much  for  your  painful,  troublesome  complaint, 
which,  I  trust,  is  only  for  a  time,  as  for  those  anxieties  which 
brought  it  on,  and  perhaps  even  now  may  be  nursing  its  malig- 
nity. Tell  me,  dearest  of  my  friends,  is  your  mind  at  peace, 
or  has  anything,  yet  unknown  to  me,  happened  to  give  you 
fresh  disquiet,  and  steal  from  you  all  the  pleasant  dreams  of 
future  rest;  Are  you  still  (I  fear  you  are)  far  from  being 
comfortably  settled  1  Would  to  God  it  were  in  my  power  to 
contribute  towards  the  bringing  of  you  into  the  haven  where 
you  would  be.  But  you  are  too  well  skilled  in  the  philosophy 
of  consolation  to  need  my  humble  tribute  of  advice  ;  in  pain, 
and  in  sickness,  and  in  all  manner  of  disappointments,  I  trust 
you  have  that  within  you  which  shall  speak  peace  to  your 
mind.     Make  it,  1  entreat  you,  one  of  your  puny  comforts  that 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  31 

I  feel  for  you,  and  share  all  your  griefs  with  you.  I  feel  as 
if  I  were  troubling  you  about  liLtle  things;  now  1  am  going  to 
resume  the  subject  of  our  last  two  letters,  but  it  may  divert  us 
both  from  unpleasanter  feelings  to  make  such  matters,  in  a  man- 
ner, of  importance.  Without  further  apology,  then,  it  was  not 
that  I  did  not  relish,  that  I  did  not  in  my  heart  thank  you  for 
those  little  pictures  of  your  feelings  which  you  lately  sent  me, 
if  I  neglected  to  mention  them.  You  may  remember  you  had 
said  much  the  same  things  before  to  me  on  the  same  subject 
in  a  former  letter,  and  I  considered  those  last  verses  as  only 
the  identical  thoughts  better  clothed;  either  way  (m  prose  or 
verse),  such  poetry  must  be  welcome  to  me.  I  love  them  as  I 
love  the  Confessions  of  Rousseau,  and  for  the  same  reason  ; 
the  same  frankness,  the  same  openness  of  heart,  the  same 
disclosure  of  all  the  most  hidden  and  delicate  affections  of  the 
mind :  they  make  me  proud  to  be  thus  esteemed  worthy  of 
the  place  of  friend-confessor,  brother-confessor,  to  a  man  like 
Coleridge.  This  last  is,  I  acknowledge,  language  too  high 
for  friendship  ;  but  it  is  also,  I  declare,  too  sincere  for  flattery. 
Now,  to  put  on  stilts,  and  talk  magnificently  about  trifles.  I 
condescend,  then,  to  your  counsel,  Coleridge,  and  allow  my 
first  sonnet  (sick  to  death  am  I  to  make  mention  of  my  sonnets, 
and  I  blush  to  be  so  taken  up  with  them,  indeed  I  do),  I  allow 

it  to  run  thus,  *  Fairy  Land,''  &,c.,  (fee,  as  I  last  wrote  it. 

****** 

"The  fragments  I  now  send  you  I  want  printed  to  get  rid 
of  'em  ;  for,  while  they  stick  burlike  to  my  memory,  they 
tempt  me  to  go  on  with  the  idle  trade  of  versifying,  which  I 
long,  most  sincerely  I  speak  it,  I  long  to  leave  oft',  for  it  is 
unprofitable  to  my  soul ;  I  feel  it  is  ;  and  these  questions  about 
words  and  debates  about  alterations  take  me  off,  I  am  con- 
scious, from  the  proper  business  of  my  life.  Take  my  sonnets, 
once  for  all,  and  do  not  propose  any  reamendments,  or  men- 
tion them  again  in  any  shape  to  me,  I  charge  you.  I  blush 
that  my  mind  can  consider  them  as  things  of  any  worth. 
And,  pray,  admit  or  reject  these  fragments  as  you  like  or  dis- 
like them,  without  ceremony.  Call  'em  sketches,  fragments, 
or  what  you  will,  and  do  not  entitle  any  of  my  things  love 
sonnets,  as  I  told  you  to  call  'em  ;  'twill  only  make  me  look 
little  in  my  own  eyes  ;  for  it  is  a  passion  of  which  I  retain 
nothing  :  'twas  a  weakness,  concerning  which  I  may  say,  in 
the  words  of  Petrarch  (whose  life  is  now  open  before  me),  '  if 
it  drew  me  out  of  some  vices,  it  also  prevented  the  growth  of 
many  virtues,  filling  me  with  the  love  of  the  creature  rather 
than  the  Creator,  which  is  the  death  of  the  soul.'  Thank 
God,  the  folly  has  left  me  for  ever  ;  not  even  a  review  of  my 


32  LETTERS   TO   COLERIDGE. 

love  verses  renews  one  wayward  wish  in  me  ;  and  if  I  am  at 
all  solicitous  to  trim  'em  out  in  their  best  apparel,  it  is  because 
they  are  to  make  their  appearance  in  good  company.  Now  to 
my  fragments.  Lest  you  have  lost  my  Grandame,  she  shall  be 
one.  'Tis  among  the  few  verses  I  ever  wrote,  that  to  Mary 
is  another,  which  profit  me  in  the  recollection.  God  love  her  ; 
may  we  two  never  love  each  other  less  ! 

"  These,  Coleridge,  are  the  few  sketches  I  have  thought 
worth  preserving  ;  how  will  they  relish  thus  detached  ?  Will 
you  reject  all  or  any  of  them  ?  They  are  thine,  do  whatsoever 
thou  listeth  with  them.  My  eyes  ache  with  writing  long  and 
late,  and  I  wax  wondrous  sleepy.  God  bless  you  and  yours, 
me  and  mine.     Good-night. 

"C.  Lamb. 

"  I  will  keep  my  eyes  open  reluctantly  a  minute  longer  to 
tell  you  that  I  love  you  for  those  simple,  tender,  heart-flowing 
lines  with  which  you  conclude  your  last,  and,  in  my  eye,  best 
sonnet  (so  you  call  'em),  '  So,  for  the  mother's  sake,  the  child 
was  dear,  and  dearer  was  the  mother  for  the  child.'  '^Cultivate 
simplicity,  Coleridge,  or  rather,  I  should  say,  banish  elabo- 
rateness ;  for  simplicity  springs  spontaneous  from  the  heart, 
and  carries  into  daylight  with  its  own  modest  buds,  and  gen- 
uine, sweet,  and  clear  flowers  of  expression.  I  allow  no  hot- 
beds in  the  garden  of  Parnassus.  I  am  unvi^illing  to  go  to  bed 
and  leave  my  sheet  unfilled  (a  good  piece  of  night  work  for  an 
idle  body  like  me),  so  will  finish  by  begging  you  to  send  me 
the  earliest  account  of  your  complaint,  its  progress,  or  (as  I 
hope  to  God  you  will  be  able  to  send  me)  the  tale  of  your  re- 
covery, or  at  least  amendment.  My  tenderest  remembrances 
to  your  Sara. 

"  Once  more  good-night." 

A  wish  to  dedicate  his  portion  of  the  volume  to  his  sister 
gave  occasion  to  the  following  touching  letter : — 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Coleridge,  I  love  you  for  dedicating  your  poetry  to  Bowles  : 
Genius  of  the  sacred  fountain  of  tears,  it  was  he  who  led  you 
gently  by  the  hand  through  all  this  valley  of  weeping,  showed 
you  the  dark  green  yew-trees  and  the  willow  shades  where, 
by  the  fall  of  waters,  you  might  indulge  an  uncomplaining 
melancholy,  a  delicious  regret  for  the  past,  or  weave  fine  vis- 
ions of  that  awful  future,  '  when  all  the  vanities  of  life's  brief 
day  oblivion's  hurrying  hand  hath  swept  away,  and  all  its 
sorrows  at  the  awful  blast  of  the  archangel's  trump  are  but  as 
shadows  past.'     I  have  another  sort  of  dedication  in  my  head 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  33 

for  my  few  things,  which  I  want  to  know  if  you  approve  of, 
and  can  insert.  I  mean  to  inscribe  them  to  my  sister.  It 
will  be  unexpected,  and  it  will  give  her  pleasure  ;  or  do  you 
think  it  will  look  whimsical  at  all  ?  As  1  have  not  spoken  to 
her  about  it,  I  can  easily  reject  the  idea.  But  there  is  a 
monotony  in  the  affections,  which  people  living  together,  or, 
as  we  do  now,  very  frequently  seeing  each  other,  are  apt  to 
give  into  ;  a  sort  of  indifference  in  the  expression  of  kindness 
for  each  other,  which  demands  that  we  should  sometimes  call 
to  our  aid  the  trickery  of  surprise.  Do.  you  publish  with 
Lloyd,  or  without  him  ?  in  either  case  my  little  portion  may 
come  last,  and,  after  the  fashion  of  orders  to  a  country  corre- 
spondent, I  will  give  directions  how  1  should  like  to  have  'em 
done.     The  title-page  to  stand  thus  : — 

POEMS, 

BY 

CHARLES  LAMB,  OF  THE  INDIA-HOUSE. 

"  Under  this  title  the  following  motto,  which,  for  want  of 
room,  I  put  over  leaf,  and  desire  you  to  insert  whether  yon 
like  it  or  no.  May  not  a  gentleman  choose  what  arms,  mot- 
toes, or  armorial  bearings  the  herald  will  give  him  leave,  with- 
out consulting  his  republican  friend,  who  might  advise  none  ? 
May  not  a  publican  put  up  the  sign  of  the  Saracen's  Head, 
even  though  his  undiscerning  neighbour  should  prefer,  as  more 
genteel,  the  Cat  and  Gridiron  ? 

"  This  beauty,  in  the  blossom  of  my  youth, 
When  my  first  fire  knew  no  adult'rate  incense, 
Nor  I  no  way  to  flatter  but  my  fondness, 
In  the  best  language  my  true  tongue  could  tell  me, 
And  all  the  broken  sighs  my  sick  heart  lend  me. 
I  sued  and  served.    Long  did  1  love  this  lady.'  " — Massinger. 

THE    DEDICATION. 

THE    FEW    FOLLOWING    POEMS, 

CREATURES    OF    THE    FANCY    AND    THE    FEELING 

IN    life's    more    VACANT    HOURS, 

PRODUCED,    FOR    THE    MOST    PART,    BY 

LOVE    IN    IDLENESS, 

ARE, 

WITH    ALL    A    brother's    FONDNESS, 

INSCRIBED    TO 

MARY  ANN  LAMB, 

THE    author's    best    FRIEND    AND    SISTER. 

15  3 


34  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

"  This  is  the  pomp  and  paraphernalia  of  parting,  with  which 
I  take  my  leave  of  a  passion  which  has  reigned  so  royally  (so 
long"*  within  me  ;  thus,  with  its  trappings  of  leaureateship,  I 
fling  it  oflf,  pleased  and  satisfied  with  myself  that  the  weakness 
troubles  me  no  longer.  I  am  wedded,  Coleridge,  to  the  for- 
tunes of  my  sister  and  my  poor  old  father.  Oh  !  my  friend,  I 
think  sometimes  could  I  recall  the  days  that  are  past,  which 
among  them  should  I  choose  ?  not  those  '  merrier  days,'  not 
the  '  pleasant  days  of  hope,'  not  '  those  wanderings  with  a 
fair-hair'd  maid,'  which  I  have  so  often  and  so  feelingly  re- 
gretted, but  the  days,  Coleridge,  of  a  mot  her'' s  fondness  for  her 
schoolboy.  What  would  I  give  to  call  her  back  to  earth  for 
otie  day,  on  my  knees  to  ask  her  pardon  for  all  those  little  as- 
perities of  temper  which,  from  time  to  time,  have  given  her 
gentle  spirit  pain  1  and  the  day,  my  friend,  I  trust,  will  come, 
there  will  be  '  time  enough'  for  kind  offices  of  love,  if  '  Heaven's 
eternal  year'  be  ours.  Hereafter  her  meek  spirit  shall  not  re- 
proach me.  Oh,  my  friend,  cultivate  the  filial  feelings  !  and 
let  no  man  think  himself  released  from  the  kind  '  charities'  of 
relationship  ;  these  shall  give  him  peace  at  the  last ;  these 
are  the  best  foundation  for  every  species  of  benevolence.  I 
rejoice  to  hear,  by  certain  channels,  that  you,  my  friend,  are 
reconciled  with  all  your  relations.  'Tis  the  most  kindly  and 
natural  species  of  love,  and  we  have  all  the  associated  train  of 
early  feelings  to  secure  its  strength  and  perpetuity.  Send 
me  an  account  of  your  health  ;  indeed  I  am  solicitous  about 
you.     God  love  you  and  yours. 

"C.  Lamb." 

The  following,  written  about  this  time,  alludes  to  some  de- 
sponding expression  in  a  letter  which  is  lost,  and  which  Cole- 
ridge had  combated. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  I  had  put  my  letter  into  the  post  rather  hastily,  not  ex- 
pecting to  have  to  acknowledge  another  from  you  so  soon. 
This  morning's  present  has  made  me  alive  again  :  my  last 
night's  epistle  was  childishly  querulous;  but  you  have  put  a 
little  life  into  me,  and  I  will  thank  you  for  your  remembrance 
of  me  while  my  sense  of  it  is  yet  warm  ;  for  if  I  linger  a  day 
or  two  I  may  use  the  same  phrase  of  acknowledgment,  or 
similar,  but  the  feeling  that  dictates  it  now  will  be  gone.  I 
shall  send  you  a  caput  mortuvm,  not  a  cor  vivcns.  Thy 
Watchman's,  thy  bellman's  verses  I  do  retort  upon  thee,  thou 
libellous  varlet ;  why  you  cried  the  hours  yourself,  and  who 
made  you  so  proud?     But  I  submit,  to  show  my  humility, 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  35 

most  implicitly  to  your  dogmas.  I  reject  entirely  the  copy  of 
verses  you  reject.  With  regard  to  my  leaving  off  versifying 
you  have  said  so  many  pretty  things,  so  many  fine  compli- 
ments, ingeniously  decked  out  in  the  garb  of  sincerity,  and 
undoubtedly  springing  from  a  present  feeling  somewhat  like 
sincerity,  that  you  might  melt  the  most  un-muse-ical  soul — did 
you  not  (now  for  a  Rowland  compliment  for  your  profusion  of 
Olivers),  did  you  not,  in  your  very  epistle,  by  the  many  pretty 
fancies  and  profusion  of  heart  displayed  in  it,  dissuade  and  dis- 
courage me  irom  attempting  anything  after  you  ?  At  present  I 
have  not  leisure  to  make  verses,  nor  anything  approaching  to 
a  fondness  for  the  exercise.  In  the  ignorant  present  time, 
who  can  answer  for  the  future  man  ?  '  At  lovers'  perjuries 
Jove  laughes' — and  poets  have  sometimes  a  disingenuous  way 
of  forswearing  their  occupation.  This,  though,  is  not  my  case. 
Publish  your  Burns  when  and  how  you  like,  it  will  be  new  to 
me ;  my  memory  of  it  is  very  confused,  and  tainted  with  un- 
pleasant associations.  Burns  was  the  god  of  my  idolatry,  as 
Bowles  of  yours.  I  am  jealous  of  your  fraternizing  with 
Bowles,  when  I  think  you  relish  him  more  than  Burns,  or  my 
old  favourite,  Cowper.  But  you  conciliate  matters  when  you 
talk  of  the  '  divine  chitchat'  of  the  latter :  by  the  expression, 
1  see  you  thoroughly  relish  him.  I  love  Mrs.  Coleridge  for 
her  excuses  a  hundred  fold  more  dearly  than  if  she  heaped 
*  line  upon  line,'  out  Hannah-ing  Hannah  More ;  and  had 
rather  hear  you  sing  *  Did  a  very  little  baby'  by  your  family 
fireside,  than  listen  to  you,  when  you  were  repeating  one  of 
Bowles's  sweetest  sonnets,  in  your  sweet  manner,  while  we 
two  were  indulging  sympathy,  a  solitary  luxury,  by  the  fire- 
side at  the  Salutation.  Yet  have  1  no  higher  ideas  of  heaven. 
Your  company  was  one  '  cordial  in  this  melancholy  vale  ;'  the 
remembrance  of  it  is  a  blessing  partly,  and  partly  a  curse. 
When  I  can  abstract  myself  from  things  present,  I  can  enjoy 
it  with  a  freshness  of  relish  ;  but  it  more  constantly  operates 
to  an  unfavourable  comparison  with  the  uninteresting  converse 
I  always  and  only  can  partake  in.  Not  a  soul  loves  Bowles 
here  \  scarce  one  has  heard  of  Burns  ;  few  but  laugh  at  me 
for  reading  my  Testament ;  they  talk  a  language  I  understand 
not ;  1  conceal  sentiments  that  would  be  a  puzzle  to  them.  I 
can  only  converse  with  you  by  letter,  and  with  the  dead  in 
their  books.  My  sister,  indeed,  is  all  I  can  wish  in  a  com- 
panion ;  but  our  spirits  are  alike  poorly;  our  reading  and 
knowledge  from  the  selfsame  sources  ;  our  communication 
with  the  scenes  of  the  world  alike  narrow  ;  never  havinij  kept 
separate  company,  or  any  'company'  togetfur ;  never  having 
read  separate  books,  and  few  books  together,  what  knowledge 


36  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

have  we  to  convey  to  each  other  ?  In  our  little  range  of  duties 
and  connexions,  how  few  sentiments  can  take  place,  without 
friends,  with  few  books,  with  a  taste  for  religion  rather  than  a 
strong  religious  habit !  We  need  some  support,  some  leading- 
strings  to  cheer  and  direct  us  ;  you  talk  very  wisely,  and  be  not 
sparing  of  your  advice.  Continue  to  remember  us,  and  to  show  us 
you  do  remember  us  :  we  will  take  as  lively  an  interest  in  what 
concerns  you  and  yours.  All  I  can  add  to  your  happiness  will 
be  sympathy  :  you  can  add  to  mine  more  ;  you  can  teach  me 
wisdom.  I  am  indeed  an  unreasonable  correspondent;  but  I 
was  unwilling  to  let  my  last  night's  letter  go  off  without  this 
qualifier :  you  will  perceive  by  this  my  mind  is  easier,  and 
you  will  rejoice.  I  do  not  expect  or  wish  you  to  write  till 
you  are  moved  ;  and,  of  course,  shall  not,  till  you  announce  to 
me  that  event,  think  of  writing  myself.  Love  to  Mrs.  Cole- 
ridge and  David  Hartley,  and  my  kind  remembrance  to  Lloyd 
if  he  is  with  you.  "  C.  Lamb. 

"  I  will  get  '  Nature  and  Art ;'   have  not  seen  it  yet,  nor 
any  of  Jeremy  Taylor's  works." 


CHAPTER  HL 

[1797.] 
Letters  to  Coleridge. 

The  volume  which  was  to  combine  the  early  poetry  of  the 
three  friends  was  not  completed  in  the  year  1796,  and  pro- 
ceeded slowly  through  the  press  in  the  following  year ;  Lamb 
occasionally  submitting  an  additional  sonnet  or  correction  of 
one  already  sent  to  the  judgment  of  Coleridge,  and  filling  long 
letters  with  minute  suggestions  on  Coleridge's  share  of  the 
work,  and  high  but  honest  expressions  of  praise  of  particular 
images  and  thoughts.  The  eulogy  is  only  interesting  as  indic- 
ative of  the  reverential  feeling  with  which  Lamb  regarded 
the  genius  of  Coleridge ;  but  one  or  two  specimens  of  the 
gentle  rebuke  which  he  ventured  on,  when  the  gorgeousness 
of  Coleridge's  language  seemed  to  oppress  his  sense,  are 
worthy  of  preservation.  The  following  relates  to  a  line  in 
the  noble  Ode  on  the  Departing  Year,  in  which  Coleridge  had 
written  of 

"  Th'  ethereal  multitude, 
Whose  purple  locks  with  snow-white  glories  3honc." 


LETTERS    TO     COLERIDGE.  37 

" '  Purple  locks  and  snow-white  glories  !'  these  are  things 
the  muse  talks  about  when,  to  borrow  H.  Walpole's  witty 
phrase,  she  is  not  finely  phrensied,  or  a  little  lightheaded,  that's 
all — '  Purple  locks  !'  They  may  manage  those  things  dif- 
ferently in  fairy  land  ;  but  your  *  golden  tresses'  are  to  my 
fancy." 

On  this  remonstrance  Coleridge  changed  the  "  purple"  into 
'•  golden,"  defending  his  original  epithet ;  and  Lamb  thus  gave 
up  the  point : — 

"  '  Golden  locks  and  snow-white  glories'  are  as  incongruous 
as  your  former  ;  and  if  the  great  Italian  painters,  of  whom  my 
friend  knows  about  as  much  as  the  man  in  the  moon,  if  these 
great  gentleman  be  on  your  side,  I  see  no  harm  in  your  re- 
taining the  purple.  The  glories  that  /have  observed  to  en- 
circle the  heads  of  saints  and  madonas  in  those  old  paintings 
have  been  mostly  of  a  dirty  drab-coloured  yellow — a  dull  gam- 
bogian.  Keep  your  old  line  ;  it  will  excite  a  confused  kind 
of  pleasurable  idea  in  the  reader's  mind,  not  clear  enough  to 
be  called  a  conception,  nor  just  enough,  I  think,  to  reduce  to 
painting.  It  is  a  rich  line,  you  say  ;  and  riches  hide  many 
faults."  And  the  word  "  wreathed"  was  ultimately  adopted 
instead  of  purple  or  golden  :  but  the  snow-white  glories  remain. 

Not  satisfied  with  the  dedication  of  his  portion  of  the  volume 
to  his  sister,  and  the  sonnet  which  had  been  sent  to  the  press, 
Lamb  urged  on  Coleridge  the  insertion  of  another,  which  seems 
to  have  been  ultimately  withheld  as  too  poor  in  poetical  merit 
for  publication.  The  rejected  sonnet,  and  the  references  made 
to  it  by  the  writer,  have  an  interest  now  beyoiid  what  mere 
fancy  can  giv^e.  After  various  critical  remarks  on  an  ode  of 
Coleridge,  he  thus  introduced  the  subject : — ■ 

"If  the  fraternal  sentiment  conveyed  in  the  following  lines 
will  alone  for  the  total  want  of  anything  like  merit  or  genius 
in  it,  I  desire  you  will  print  it  next  after  my  sonnet  to  my  sister 

Friend  of  my  earliest  years  and  childish  days, 

My  joys,  my  sorrows,  thou  with  me  hast  shared, 

Companion  dear  ;  and  we  alike  have  fared. 
Poor  pilgrims  we,  through  life's  unequal  ways. 
It  were  unwisely  done,  should  we  refuse 

To  cheer  our  path,  as  featly  as  we  may, 
Our  lonely  path  to  cheer,  as  travellers  use 

With  merry  song,  quaint  tale,  or  roundelay. 
And  we  will  sometimes  talk  past  trouhles  o'er, 

Of  mercies  shown,  and  all  our  sickness  heal'd, 
And  in  his  judgments  God  rcmemb'ring  love  : 
And  we  will  learn  to  praise  God  evermore, 

For  those  *  glad  tidings  of  great  joy,'  revealed 
By  that  sooth  messenger  sent  from  above. 

1707. 


38  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

"  This  has  been  a  sad  long  letter  of  business,  with  no  room 
in  it  for  what  honest  Bunyan  terms  heart-work.  1  have  just 
room  left  to  congratulate  you  on  your  removal  to  Stowey ;  to 
wish  success  to  all  your  projects  ;  to  '  bid  fair  peace'  be  to  that 
house ;  to  send  my  love  and  best  wishes,  breathed  warmly, 
after  your  dear  Sara  and  her  little  David  Hartley.  If  Lloyd 
be  with  you,  bid  him  write  to  me  ;  I  feel  to  whom  1  am  obliged 
primarily  for  two  very  friendly  letters  I  have  received  al- 
ready from  him.  A  dainly  sweet  book  that  '  Nature  and  Art' 
is.  I  am  at  present  re-rereading  Priestley's  Examination  of 
the  Scotch  Doctors  ;  how  the  rogue  strings  'em  up !  three  to- 
gether. You  have  no  doubt  read  that  clear,  strong,  humorous, 
most  entertaining  peace  of  reasoning  ?  If  not,  procure  it, 
and  be  exquisitely  amused,  1  wish  I  could  get  more  of 
Priestley's  works.  Can  you  recommend  me  to  any  more 
books,  easy  of  access,  such  as  circulating  shops  afford  ?  God 
bless  you  and  yours. 

"  Mondy  morning,  at  office. 

"  Poor  Mary  is  very  unwell  with  a  sore  throat  and  a  slight 
species  of  scarlet  fever.     God  bless  her  too." 

He  recurs  to  the  subject  in  his  next  letter,  which  is  also  in- 
teresting as  urging  Coleridge  to  attempt  some  great  poem 
worthy  of  his  genius. 

TO    MR.  COLERIDGE, 

"  I  need  not  repeat  my  wishes  to  have  my  little  sonnets 
printed  verbatim  my  last  way.  In  particular,  I  fear  lest  you 
should  prefer  printing  my  first  sonnet,  as  you  have  done  more 
than  once,  '  did  the  wand  of  Merlin  wave,'  it  looks  so  like  Mr. 
Merlin,  the  ingenious  successor  of  the  immortal  Merlin,  now 
living  in  good  health  and  spirits,  and  flourishing  in  magical 
reputation,  in  Oxford-street ;  and,  on  my  life,  one  half  who 
read  it  would  understand  it  so.  Do  put  'em  forth  finally,  as  I 
have,  in  various  letters,  settled  it ;  for  first  a  man's  self  is  to 
be  pleased,  and  then  his  friends,  and,  of  course,  the  greater 
number  of  his  friends,  if  they  differ  inter  se.  Thus  taste  may 
safely  be  put  to  the  vote.  I  do  long  to  see  our  names  to- 
gether ;  not  for  vanity's  sake,  and  naughty  pride  of  heart  alto- 
gether, for  not  a  living  soul  I  know,  or  am  intimate  with,  will 
scarce  read  the  book  ;  so  I  shall  gain  nothing,  quoad  famam ; 
and  yet  there  is  a  little  vanity  mixes  in  it,  I  cannot  help  denying. 
I  am  aware  of  the  unpoetical  cast  of  the  six  last  lines  of  my 
last  sonnet,  and  think  myself  unwarranted  in  smuggling  so 
tame  a  thing  into  the  book  ;  only  the  sentiments  of  those  six 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  39 

lines  are  thoroughly  congenial  to  me  in  my  state  of  mind,  and 
I  wish  to  accumulate  perpetuating  tokens  of  my  affection  to 
poor  Mary  ;  that  it  has  no  originality  in  its  cast,  nor  anything 
in  the  feelings,  but  what  is  common  and  natural  to  thousands, 
nor  ought  properly  to  be  called  poetry,  1  see  ;  still  it  will  tend 
to  keep  present  to  my  mind  a  view  of  things  which  I  ought 
to  indulge.  These  six  lines,  too,  have  not,  to  a  reader,  a  con 
nectedness  with  the  foregoing.  Omit  it  if  you  like.  What  a 
treasure  it  is  to  my  poor,  indolent,  and  unemployed  mind  thus 
to  lay  hold  on  a  subject  to  talk  about,  though  'lis  but  a  sonnet, 
and  that  of  the  lowest  order  !  How  mournfully  inactive  I  am  ! 
'Tis  night ;  good-night. 

"  My  sister,  I  thank  God,  is  nigh  recovered  :  she  was  se- 
riously ill.  Do,  in  your  next  letter,  and  that  right  soon,  give 
me  some  satisfaction  respecting  your  present  situation  at 
Siowey.  Is  it  a  farm  you  have  got?  and  what  does  your 
worship  know  about  farming  ? 

*'  Coleridge,  I  want  you  to  write  an  epic  poem.  Nothing 
short  of  it  can  satisfy  the  vast  capacity  of  true  poetic  genius. 
Having  one  great  end  to  direct  all  your  poetical  faculties  to, 
and  on  which  to  lay  out  your  hopes,  your  ambition  will  show 
you  to  what  you  are  equal.  By  the  sacred  energies  of  Mil- 
ton.' by  the  dainty,  sweet,  and  soothing  phantasies  of  honey- 
tongued  Spenser !  I  adjure  you  to  attempt  the  epic.  Or  do 
something  more  ample  than  the  writing  an  occasional  brief 
ode  or  sonnet ;  something  '  to  make  yourself  for  ever  known — 
to  make  the  age  to  come  your  own.'  But  I  prate  ;  doubtless 
you  meditate  something.  When  you  are  exalted  among  the 
lords  of.epic  fame,  I  shall  recall  with  pleasure,  and  exultingly, 
the  days  of  your  humility,  when  you  disdained  not  to  put  forth, 
in  the  same  volume  with  mine,  your  '  Religious  Musings,'  and 
that  other  poem  from  the  '  Joan  of  Arc,'  those  promising  first- 
fruits  of  high  renown  to  come.  You  have  learning,  you  have 
fancy,  you  have  enthusiasm,  you  have  strength,  and  amplitude 
of  wing  enow  for  flights  like  those  I  recommend.  In  the  vast 
and  unexplored  regions  of  fairy-land  there  is  ground  enough 
unfound  and  uncultivated  ;  search  these,  and  realize  your  fa- 
vourite Susquehannah  scheme.  In  all  our  comparisons  of 
taste,  I  do  not  know  whether  I  have  ever  heard  your  opinion  of 
a  poet  very  dear  to  me — the  now-out-of-fashion  Cowley.  Fa- 
vour me  with  your  judgment  of  him,  and  tell  me  if  his  prose 
essays,  in  particular,  as  well  as  no  inconsiderable  part  of  his 
verse,  be  not  delicious.  I  prefer  the  graceful  rambling  of  his 
essays  even  to  the  courtly  elegance  and  ease  of  Addison  ;  ab- 
stracting from  this  the  latter's  exquisite  humour. 


40  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

"  "When  the  little  volume  is  printed,  send  me  three  or  four, 
at  all  events  not  more  than  six  copies,  and  tell  me  if  1  put  you 
to  any  additional  expense  by  printing  with  you.  I  have  no 
thought  of  the  kind,  and  in  that  case  must  reimburse  you." 

In  the  commencement  of  this  year  Coleridge  removed  from 
Bristol  to  a  cottage  at  Nether  Stowey,  to  imbody  his  favourite 
dream  of  a  cottage  life.  This  change  of  place  probably  de- 
layed the  printing  of  the  volume  ;  and  Coleridge,  busy  with  a 
thousand  speculations,  became  irregular  in  replying  to  the  let- 
ters with  writing  which  Lamb  solaced  his  dreary  hours.  The 
following  are  the  most  interesting  portions  of  the  only  letters 
which  remain  of  this  year. 

TO    MR.  COLERIDGE. 

"  Priestley,  whom  I  sin  in  almost  adoring,  speaks  of  *  such  a 
choice  of  company  as  tends  to  keep  up  that  right  bent  and 
firmness  of  mind  which  a  necessary  intercourse  with  the  world 
would  otherwise  warp  and  relax.'  '  Such  fellowship  is  the 
true  balsam  of  life  ;  its  cement  is  infinitely  more  durable  than 
that  of  the  friendships  of  the  world,  and  it  looks  for  its  proper 
fruit  and  complete  gratification  to  the  life  beyond  the  grave.' 
Is  there  a  possible  chance  for  such  a  one  as  I  to  realize  in 
this  world  such  friendships  !  Where  am  I  to  look  for  'em  ? 
What  testimonials  shall  I  bring  of  my  being  worthy  of  such 
friendship  ?  Alas  !  the  great  and  good  go  together  in  separate 
herds,  and  leave  such  as  I  to  lag  far,  far  behind  in  all  intellect- 
ual, and,  far  more  grievous  to  say,  in  all  moral  accomplish- 
ments. Coleridge,  I  have  not  one  truly  elevated  character 
among  my  acquaintance  ;  not  one  Christian  ;  not  one,  but  un- 
dervalues Christianity — singly  what  am  I  to  do  ?  Wesley  (have 
you  read  his  life?),  was  he  not  an  elevated  character?  Wes- 
ley has  said,  '  Religion  is  not  a  solitary  thing.'  Alas  !  it  ne- 
cessarily is  so  with  me,  or  next  to  solitary.  'Tis  true  you 
write  to  me.  But  correspondence  by  letter  and  personal  in- 
timacy are  very  widely  different.  Do,  do  write  to  me,  and 
do  some  good  to  my  mind,  already  how  much  '  warped  and  re- 
laxed' by  the  world  !  'Tis  the  conclusion  of  another  evening. 
Good-night.     God  have  us  all  in  his  keeping. 

*'  If  you  are  sufficiently  at  leisure,  oblige  me  with  an  account 
of  your  plan  of  life  at  Stowey  ;  your  literary  occupations  and 
prospects  ;  in  short,  make  me  acquainted  with  every  circum- 
stance which,  as  relating  to  you,  can  be  interesting  to  me. 
Are  you  yet  a  Berkleyan  ?  Make  me  one.  I  rejoice  in  being, 
speculatively,  a  necessitarian.  Would  to  God  I  were  habit- 
ually a  practical  one.     Confirm  me  in  the  faith  of  that  great 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  41 

and  glorious  doctrine,  and  keep  me  steady  in  the  contempla- 
tion of  it.  You  some  time  since  expressed  an  intention  you 
had  of  finishing  some  extensive  work  on  the  Evidences  of 
Natural  and  Revealed  Religion.  Have  you  let  that  intention 
go?  or  are  you  doing  anything  towards  it?  Make  to  your- 
self other  ten  talents.  My  letter  is  full  of  nothingness.  I 
talk  of  iiothing.  But  I  must  talk.  1  love  to  write  to  you.  I 
take  pride  in  it.  It  makes  me  think  less  meanly  of  myself. 
It  makes  me  think  myself  not  totally  disconnected  from  the 
better  part  of  mankind.  I  know  I  am  too  dissatisfied  with  the 
beings  around  me  ;  but  I  cannot  help  occasionally  exclaiming, 
'  Wo  is  me,  that  I  am  constrained  to  dwell  with  Meshech, 
and  to  have  my  habitation  among  the  tents  of  Kedar.'  I  know 
I  am  in  noways  better  in  practice  than  my  neighbours,  but  I 
have  a  taste  for  religion,  an  occasional  earnest  aspiration  after 
perfection,  which  they  have  not.  I  gain  nothing  by  being 
with  such  as  myself;  we  encourage  one  another  in  mediocrity. 
I  am  always  longing  to  be  with  men  more  excellent  than  my- 
self. All  this  must  sound  odd  to  you,  but  these  are  my  pre- 
dominant feelings  when  I  sit  down  to  write  to  you,  and  I 
should  put  force  upon  my  mind  were  1  to  reject  them.  Yet 
I  rejoice,  and  feel  my  privilege  with  gratitude,  when  I  have 
been  reading  some  wise  book,  such  as  I  have  just  been  read- 
ing, '  Priestley  on  Philosophical  Necessity,'  in  the  thought 
that  I  enjoy  a  kind  of  communion,  a  kind  of  friendship  even 
with  the  great  and  good.  Books  are  to  me  instead  of  friends. 
I  wish  they  did  not  resemble  the  latter  in  their  scarceness. 

"And  how  does  little  David  Hartley  ?  '  Ecquid  in  antiquam 
virtutem  V  Does  his  mighty  name  work  wonders  yet  upon 
his  little  frame  and  opening  mind?  I  did  not  distinctly  under- 
stand you  ;  you  don't  mean  to  make  an  actual  ploughman  of 
him  ?  Is  Lloyd  with  you  yet  ?  Are  you  intimate  with  Southey  ? 
What  poems  is  he  about  to  publish?  he  hath  a  most  prolific 
brain,  and  is  indeed  a  most  sweet  poet.  But  how  can  you 
answer  all  the  various  mass  of  interrogation  I  have  put  to  you 
in  the  course  of  the  sheet?  Write  back  just  what  you  like, 
only  write  something,  however  brief.  I  have  now  nigh  fin- 
ished my  page,  and  got  to  the  end  of  another  evening  (Mon- 
day evening),  and  my  eyes  are  heavy  and  sleepy,  and  my 
brain  unsuggestive.  I  have  just  heart  enough  awake  to  say 
good-night  once  more,  and  God  love  you,  my  dear  friend,  God 
love  us  all.     Mary  bears  an  afleciionato  remembrance  of  you. 

"  Charles  L.\mb." 

A  poem  of  Coleridge,  emulous  of  Southey's  "  Joan  of  Arc," 
which  he  proposed  to  call  the  "  Maid  of  Orleans,'*  on  whiclj 

4* 


^Z-  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

Lamb  had  made  some  critical  remarks,  produced  the  humorous 
recantation  with  which  the  following  letter  opens. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

*'  Your  poem  is  altogether  admirable  ;  parts  of  it  are  even 
exquisite.  I  perceived  all  its  excellences,  on  a  first  reading, 
as  readily  as  now  you  have  been  removing  a  supposed  film 
from  my  eyes.  I  was  oidy  struck  with  a  certain  faulty  dispro- 
portion, in  the  matter  and  the  st^le,  which  I  still  think  1  per- 
ceive, between  these  lines  and  the  former  ones.  I  had  an  end 
in  view;  I  wished  to  make  you  reject  the  poem, only  as  being 
discordant  with  the  other,  and,  in  subservience  to  that  end,  it 
was  politically  done  in  me  to  overpass  and  make  no  mention 
of  merit,  which,  could  you  think  me  capable  of  overlooking, 
might  reasonably  damn  for  ever  in  your  judgment  all  preten- 
sions in  me  to  be  critical.  There,  I  will  be  judged  by 
Lloyd  whether  I  have  not  made  a  very  handsome  recantation. 
I  was  in  the  case  of  a  man  whose  friend  has  asked  him  his 
opinion  of  a  certain  young  lady ;  the  deluded  wight  gives 
judgment  against  her  in  toto ;  don't  like  her  face,  her  walk, 
her  manners  ;  finds  fault  with  her  eyebrows  ;  can't  see  no  wit 
in  her;  his  friend  looks  blank,  he  begins  to  smell  a  rat;  wind 
veers  about;  he  acknowledges  her  good  sense,  her  judgment 
in  dress,  a  certain  simplicity  in  manners  and  honesty  of  heart  ; 
something,  too,  in  her  manners  which  gains  upon  you  after  a 
short  acquaintance  ;  and  then  her  accurate  pronunciation  of 
the  French  language,  and  a  pretty  uncultivated  taste  in  draw- 
ing. The  reconciled  gentleman  smiles  applause,  squeezes 
him  by  the  hand,  and  hopes  he  will  do  him  the  honour  of 

taking  a  bit  of  dinner  with  Mrs. and  him — a  plain  family 

dinner — some  day  next  week ;  *  for,  I  suppose,  you  never 
heard  we  were  married.  I'm  glad  to  see  you  like  my  wife, 
however  ;  you'll  come  and  see  her,  ha?'  Now,  am  I  too  proud 
to  retract  entirely  ?  Yet  I  do  perceive  I  am  in  some  sort  strait- 
ened ;  you  are  manifestly  wedded  to  this  poem,  and  what 
fancy  has  joined  let  no  man  separate.  I  turn  me  to  the  Joan 
of  Arc,  second  book. 

*'  The  solemn  openings  of  it  are  with  sounds,  which  LI. 
would  say  *  are  silence  to  the  mind.'  The  deep  preluding 
strains  are  fitted  to  initiate  the  mind,  with  a  pleasing  awe,  into 
the  sublimest  mysteries  of  theory  concerning  man's  nature, 
and  his  noblest  destination  ;  the  philosophy  of  a  first  cause  ; 
of  subordinate  agents  in  creation,  superior  to  man  ;  the  sub- 
serviency of  pagan  worship  and  pagan  faith  to  the  introduc- 
tion of  a  purer  and  more  perfect  religion,  which  you  so  ele- 
gantly describe  as  winning,  with  gradual  steps,  her  difficult 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE  43 

way  northward  from  Bethabra.  After  all  this  cometh  Joan, 
a  publican's  daughter,  silting  on  an  alehouse  bench  and  marking 
the  swingings  of  the  signboard,  finding  a  poor  man,  his  wife, 
and  six  children  starved  to  death  with  cold,  and  thence  roused 
into  a  state  of  mind  proper  to  receive  visions,  emblematical  of 
equality  ;  which,  wliat  the  devil  Joan  had  to  do  with,  I  don't 
know,  or,  indeed,  with  the  French  and  American  revolutions, 
ihoiigh  that  needs  no  pardon,  it  is  executed  so  nobly.  After 
all,  if  you  perceive  no  disproportion,  all  argument  is  vain  :  I 
do  not  so  much  object  to  parts.  Again,  when  you  talk  of 
building  your  fame  on  these  lines  in  preference  to  the  '  Reli- 
gious Musings,'  I  cannot  help  conceiving  of  you  and  of  the 
author  of  that  as  two  different  persons,  and  I  think  you  a  very 
vain  man. 

"  I  have  been  rereading  your  letter  ;  much  of  it  I  could  dis- 
pute, but  with  the  latter  part  of  it,  in  which  you  compare  the 
two  Joans,  with  respect  to  their  predispositions  for  fanaticism, 
I,  toto  corde,  coincide  with,  only  I  think  that  Southey's  strength 
rather  lies  in  the  description  of  the  emotions  of  the  Maid  under 
the  weight  of  inspiration  :  these  (I  see  no  mighty  difference 
between  her  describing  them  or  you  describing  them),  these  if 
you  only  equal,  the  previous  admirers  of  his  poems,  as  is 
natural,  will  prefer  his  ;  if  you  surpass,  prejudice  will  scarcely 
allow  it,  and  I  scarce  think  you  will  surpass,  though  your  spe- 
cimen at  the  conclusion,  I  am  in  earnest,  I  think  very  nigh 
equals  them  ;  and  in  an  account  of  a  fanatic  or  of  a  prophet, 
the  description  of  her  emotions  is  expected  to  be  most  highly 
finished.  Bv-the-way,  I  spoke  far  too  disparagingly  of  your 
lines,  and,  I  am  ashamed  to  say,  purposely.  I  should  like  you 
to  specify  or  particularize  ;  the  siory  of  the  '  Tottering  Eld,' 
of  '  his  eventful  years  all  come  and  gone,'  is  too  general ;  why 
not  make  him  a  soldier,  or  some  character,  however,  in  which 
he  has  been  witness  to  frequency  of  '  cruel  wrong  and  strange 
distress?'  I  think  I  should.  When  I  laughed  at  the  '  misera- 
ble  man  crawling  from  beneath  the  coverture,'  I  wonder  I  did 
not  perceive  that  it  was  a  laugh  of  horror,  such  as  I  have 
laughed  at  Dante's  picture  of  the  famished  Ugolino.  Without 
falsehood,  I  perceive  a  hundred  beauties  in  your  narrative. 
Yet  I  wonder  you  do  not  perceive  something  out  of  the  way, 
something  unsiinple  and  artificial  in  the  expression  '  voiceu  a 
sad  tale.'  1  hate  made-dishes  at  the  muses'  banquet.  I  be- 
lieve 1  was  wrong  in  most  of  my  other  objections.  But  surely 
'  hailed  him  immortal'  adds  nothing  to  the  terror  of  the  man's 
death,  which  it  was  your  business  to  heighten,  not  diminish 
by  a  phrase,  which  takes  away  all  terror  from  it.  I  like  th:it 
line,  '  They  closed  their  eyes  in  sleep,  nor  knew  'twas  death.' 


/ 

44  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

Indeed,  there  is  scarcely  a  line  I  do  not  like.  *  Turhid  ecstasy 
is  surely  not  so  good  as  what  you  had  written,  '  troublous. 
Turbid  rather  suits  the  muddy  kind  of  inspiration  which  Lon 
don  porter  confers.  The  versification  is,  throughout,  to  m\ 
ears,  unexceptionable,  with  no  disparagement  to  the  measure 
of  the  '  Religious  Musings,'  which  is  exactly  fitted  to  the 
thoughts. 

"  You  were  building  your  house  on  a  rock  when  you  resteci 
your  fame  on  that  poem.  I  can  scarce  bring  myself  to  be- 
lieve that  I  am  admitted  to  a  familiar  correspondence,  and 
all  the  license  of  friendship,  with  a  man  who  writes  blank 
verse  like  Milton.  Now,  this  is  delicate  flattery,  indirect  flat- 
tery. Go  on  with  your '  Maid  of  Orleans,'  and  be  content  to 
be  second  to  yourself.  I  shall  become  a  convert  to  it  when 
'tis  finished." 

****** 

"This  afternoon  I  attend  the  funeral  of  my  poor  old  aunt, 
who  died  on  Thursday.  I  own  I  am  thankful  that  the  good 
creature  has  ended  all  her  days  of  suffering  and  infirmity.  She 
was  to  me  the  '  cherisher  of  infancy,'  and  one  must  fall  on 
those  occasions  into  reflections,  which  it  would  be  common- 
place to  enumerate,  concerning  death, '  of  chance  and  change, 
and  fate  and  human  life.'  Good  God,  who  could  have  fore- 
seen all  this  but  four  months  back  !  I  had  reckoned,  in  par- 
ticular, on  my  aunt's  living  many  years ;  she  was  a  very 
hearty  old  woman.  But  she  was  a  mere  skeleton  before  she 
died,  looked  more  like  a  corpse  that  had  lain  weeks  in  the 
grave,  than  one  fresh  dead.  '  Truly  the  light  is  sweet,  and  a 
pleasant  thing  it  is  for  the  eyes  to  behold  the  sun  ;  but  let  a 
man  live  many  days  and  rejoice  in  them  all,  yet  let  him  re- 
member the  days  of  darkness,  for  they  shall  be  many.' 
Coleridge,  why  are  we  to  live  on  after  all  the  strength  and 
beauty  of  existence  are  gone,  when  all  the  life  of  life  is  fled, 
as  Burns  expresses  it  ?  Tell  Lloyd  I  have  had  thoughts  of 
turning  Quaker  ;  have  been  reading,  or  am  rather  just  begin- 
ning to  read,  a  most  capital  book,  good  thoughts  in  good  lan- 
guage, William  Penn's  '  No  Cross,  No  Crown.'  I  like  it  im- 
mensely. Unluckily,  I  went  to  one  of  his  meetings,  tell  him, 
in  St.  John's-street,  yesterday,  and  saw  a  man  under  all  the 
agitations  and  workings  of  a  fanatic,  who  believed  himself 
under  the  influence  of  some  '  inevitable  presence.'  This 
cured  me  of  Quakerism  ;  I  love  it  in  the  books  of  Penn  and 
Woolman,  but  I  detest  the  vanity  of  a  man  thinking  he  speaks 
by  the  Spirit,  when  what  he  says  an  ordinary  man  might  say 
without  all  that  quaking  and  trembling.  In  the  midst  of  his 
inspiration,  and  the  effects  of  it  were  most  noisy,  was  handed 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  45 

into  the  midst  of  the  meeting  a  most  terrible  blackguard  Wrap- 
ping sailor  ;  the  poor  man,  I  believe,  had  rather  have  been  in 
the  hottest  part  of  an  engagement,  for  the  congregation  of 
broad  brims,  together  with  the  ravings  of  the  prophet,  were 
too  much  for  his  gravity,  though  I  saw  even  he  had  delicacy 
enough  not  to  laugh  out.  And  the  inspired  gentleman,  though 
his  manner  was  so  supernatural,  yet  neither  talked  nor  pro- 
fessed to  talk  anything  more  than  good  sober  sense,  common 
morality,  with  now  and  then  a  declaration  of  not  speaking 
from  himself.  Among  other  things,  looking  back  to  his  child- 
hood and  early  youth,  he  told  the  meeting  what  a  graceless 
young  dog  he  had  been,  that  in  his  youth  he  had  a  good  share 
of  wit ;  reader,  if  thou  hadstseen  the  gentleman,  thou  wouldst 
have  sworn  that  it  must  indeed  have  been  many  years  ago, 
for  his  rueful  physiognomy  would  have  scared  away  the  play- 
ful goddess  from  the  meeting  where  he  presided  for  ever.  A 
wit  !  a  wit !  what  could  he  mean  ?  Lloyd,  it  minded  me  of 
Falkland  in  the  rivals,  '  Am  I  full  of  wit  and  humour  ?  No, 
indeed  you  are  not.  Am  I  the  life  and  soul  of  every  company 
I  come  into  ?  No,  it  cannot  be  said  you  are.'  That  hard- 
faced  gentleman,  a  wit !  Why  Nature  wrote  on  his  fanatic 
forehead  fifty  years  ago,  '  AVit  never  comes  that  comes  to  all.' 
I  siiould  be  as  scandalized  at  a  hon  mot  issuing  from  his  ora- 
cle-looking mouth,  as  to  see  Cato  go  down  a  country-dance. 
God  love  you  all.  You  are  very  good  to  submit  to  be  pleased 
with  reading  my  nothings.  'Tis  the  privilege  of  friendship  to 
talk  nonsense,  and  to  have  nonsense  respected.     Yours  ever, 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  Monday." 

TO    MR.   COLERIDGE. 

"  Your  last  letter  was  dated  the  lOlh  February  ;  in  it  you 
promised  to  write  again  the  next  day.  At  least,  1  did  not  expect 
so  long,  so  unfriend-like  a  silence.  There  was  a  time,  Col., 
when  a  remissness  of  this  sort  in  a  dear  friend  would  have 
lain  very  heavy  on  my  mind  ;  but  latterly  I  have  been  too  fa- 
miliar with  neglect  to  feel  much  from  the  semblance  of  it. 
Yet,  to  suspect  one's  self  overlooked,  and  in  the  way  to  ob- 
livion, is  a  feeling  rather  humbling  ;  perhaps,  as  tending  to 
self-mortification,  qol  unfavourable  to  the  spiritual  state.  Still, 
as  you  meant  to  confer  no  benefit  on  the  soul  of  your  friend, 
you  do  not  stand  quite  clear  from  the  imputation  of  unkindli- 
ness  (a  word  by  which  I  mean  the  diminutive  of  unkindness). 
And  then  David  Hartley  was  unwell  ;  and  how  is  tiie  small 
philosopher,  the  minute  philosopher?  and  David's  mother? 
Coleridge,  I  am  not  trifling,  nor  are  these  matter-of-fact  ques- 


46  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

tions  only.  You  are  all  very  dear  and  precious  to  me  ;  do 
what  you  will,  Col.,  you  may  hurt  me  and  vex  me  by  your  si- 
lence, but  you  cannot  estrange  my  heart  from  you  all.  I  can- 
not scatter  friendships  like  chuck  farthings,  nor  let  them  drop 
from  mine  hand  like  hourglass-sand.  I  have  but  two  or  three 
people  in  the  world  to  whom  I  am  more  than  indifferent,  and 
I  can't  afford  to  whistle  them  off  to  the  winds. 

''  My  sister  has  recovered  from  her  illness.  May  that  mer- 
ciful God  make  tender  my  heart,  and  make  me  as  thankful  as 
in  my  distress  I  was  earnest  in  my  prayers.  Congratulate 
me  on  an  ever-present  and  never-alienable  friend  like  her. 
And  do,  do  insert,  if  you  have  not  lost^  my  dedication.  It  will 
have  lost  its  value  by  coming  so  late.  If  you  are  really  going 
on  with  that  volume,  I  shall  be  enabled  in  a  day  or  two  to 
send  you  a  short  poem  to  insert.  Now,  do  answer  this 
Friendship,  and  acts  of  friendship,  should  be  reciprocal,  and 
free  as  the  air;  a  friend  should  never  be  reduced  to  beg  an 
alms  of  his  fellow.  Yet  I  will  beg  an  alms  ;  I  entreat  you  to 
write,  and  tell  me  all  about  poor  L.  L.,  and  all  of  you. 

"  God  love  and  preserve  you  all. 

"C.  Lamb." 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  I  Stared  with  wild  wonderment  to  see  thy  well-known 
hand  again.  It  revived  many  a  pleasing  recollection  of  an 
epistolary  intercourse,  of  late  strangely  suspended,  once  the 
pride  of  my  life.  Before  I  even  opened  thy  letter,  I  figured 
to  myself  a  sort  of  complacency  which  my  little  hoard  at  home 
would  feel  at  receiving  the  new-comer  into  the  little  drawer, 
where  I  keep  my  treasures  of  this  kind.  You  have  done  well 
in  writing  to  me.  The  little  room  (was  it  not  a  little  one  ?) 
at  the  Salutation  was  already  in  the  way  of  becoming  a  fading 
idea ;  it  had  begun  to  be  classed  in  my  memory  with  those 
*  wanderings  with  a  fair-hair'd  maid,'  in  the  recollection  of 
which  I  feel  I  have  no  property.  You  press  me,  very  kindly 
do  you  press  me,  to  come  to  Stowey ;  obstacles  strong  as 
death  prevent  me  at  present;  maybe  I  may  be  able  to  come 
before  the  year  is  out ;  believe  me,  I  will  come  as  soon  as  I 
can,  but  I  dread  naming  a  probable  time.  It  depends  on  fifty 
things,  besides  the  expense,  which  is   iiO\f  nothing.     As   to 

.  caprice  may  grant  what  caprice  only  refused,  and  it  is 

no  more  hardship,  rightly  considered,  to  be  dependant  on  him 
for  pleasure,  than  to  lie  at  the  mercy  of  the  rain  and  sunshine 
for  the  enjoyment  of  a  holyday ;  in  either  case  we  are  not  to 
look  for  a  suspension  of  the  laws  of  nature.  *  Grill  will  be 
grill.'     Vide  Spenser. 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  47 

"  I  could  not  but  smile  at  the  compromise  you  make  with 
me  for  printing  Lloyd's  poems  first,  but  there  is  in  nature,  ] 
fear,  too  many  tendencies  to  envy  and  jealousy  not  to  justify 
you  in  your  apology.  Yet,  if  any  one  is  welcome  to  pre-emi 
nence  from  me,  it  is  Lloyd,  for  he  would  be  the  last  to  desire 
it.  So  pray  let  his  name  uniformly  precede  mine,  for  it 
would  be  treating  me  like  a  child  to  suppose  it  could  give  me 
pain.  Yet,  alas  !  I  am  not  insusceptible  of  the  bad  passions. 
Thank  God,  I  have  the  ingenuousness  to  be  ashamed  of  them. 
I  am  dearly  fond  of  Charles  Lloyd ;  he  is  all  goodness,  and  I 
have  too  much  of  the  world  in  my  composition  to  feel  myseli 
thoroughly  deserving  of  his  friendship. 

"  Lloyd  tells  me  that  Sheridan  put  you  upon  writing  your 
tragedy.  I  hope  you  are  only  Coleridgeizing  when  you  talk 
of  finishing  it  in  a  ^ew  days.  Shakspeare  was  a  more  modest 
man,  but  you  best  know  your  own  power.  ""'     ^ 

''  Of  my  last  poem  you  speak  slightingly  ;  surely  the  longei 
stanzas  were  pretty  tolerable  ;  at  least  there  was  one  good 
line  in  it. 

'  Thick-shaded  trees,  with  dark  green  leaf  rich  clad.' 

"  To  adopt  your  own  expression,  I  call  this  a  '  rich*  line,  a 
fine  full  line.  And  some  others  I  thought  even  beautiful.  Be- 
lieve me,  my  litte  gentleman  will  feel  some  repugnance  at 
riding  behind  in  the  basket,  though,  I  confess,  in  pretty  good 
company.  Your  picture  of  idiocy,  with  the  sugar-loaf  head, 
is  exquisite ;  but  are  you  not  too  severe  upon  our  more  fa- 
voured brethren  in  fatuity  ?  I  send  you  a  trifling  letter  ;  but 
you  have  only  to  think  that  I  have  been  skimming  the  super- 
fices  of  my  mind,  and  found  it  only  froth.  Now,  do  write 
again  ;  you  cannot  believe  how  I  long  and  love  always  to  hear 
about  you. 

*'  Yours  most  affectionately, 

"  Charles  Lamb. 
"  Monday  night." 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

*'  Did  you  seize  the  grand  opportunity  of  seeing  Kosciusko 
while  he  was  at  Bristol?  I  never  saw  a  hero,  I  wonder  how 
they  look.  I  have  been  reading  a  most  curious  romance-liko 
work,  called  the  Life  of  John  Buncle,  Esq.  'Tis  very  inter- 
esting, and  an  extraordinary  compound  of  all  manner  of  sub- 
jects, from  the  depth  of  the  ludicrous  to  the  heights  of  sublime 
religious  truth.  There  is  much  abstruse  science  in  it  above 
my  cut,  and  an  infinite  fund  of  pleasantry.  John  Buncle  is  a 
famous  fine  man,  formed  in  nature's  most  eccentric  hour.     I 


48  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

am  ashamed  of  what  I  write.  But  1  have  no  topic  to  talk  of. 
I  see  nobody,  and  sit,  and  read,  or  walk  alone,  and  hear  no- 
thing. I  am  quite  lost  to  conversation  from  disuse  ;  and  out 
of  the  sphere  of  my  little  family,  who,  I  am  thankful,  are 
dearer  and  dearer  to  me  every  day,  I  see  no  face  that  bright- 
ens up  at  my  approach.  My  friends  are  at  a  distance  (meaning 
Birmingham  and  Stowey)  ;  worldly  hopes  are  at  a  low  ebb  with 
me,  and  unworldly  thoughts  are  not  yet  familiarized  to  me, 
though  I  occasionally  indulge  in  them.  Still  I  feel  a  calm  not 
unlike  content.  I  think  it  is  sometimes  more  akin  to  physical 
stupidity  than  to  a  heaven-flowing  serenity  and  peace.  What 
right  have  I  to  obtrude  all  this  upon  you  ?  and  what  is  such  a 
letter  to  you  ?  and,  if  I  come  to  Stowey,  what  conversation 
can  I  furnish  to  compensate  my  friend  for  those  stores  of 
knowledge  and  of  fancy  ;  those  delightful  treasures  of  wisdom, 
which,  I  know,  he  will  open  to  me  ?  But  it  is  better  to  give 
than  to  receive ;  and  I  was  a  very  patient  hearer  and  docile 
scholar  in  our  winter  evenings  at  Mr.  May's  ;  was  I  not.  Col.  ? 
What  I  have  owed  to  thee,  my  heart  can  ne'er  forget. 
*'  God  love  you  and  yours. 

"  C.  L. 

"  Saturday." 

At  length  the  small  volume  containing  the  poems  of  Cole- 
ridge, Lloyd,  and  Lamb,  was  published  by  Mr.  Cottle  at  Bris- 
tol. It  excited  little  attention;  but  Lamb  had  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  his  dedication  to  his  sister  printed  in  good  set  form, 
after  his  own  fashion,  and  of  beholding  the  delight  and  pride 
with  which  she  received  it.  This  little  book,  now  very  scarce, 
had  the  following  motto  expressive  of  Coleridge's  feeling  to- 
wards his  associates  : — Duplex  nobis  vinculufn,  ct  amicitm  et 
sirnilium  junctarumque  Cam^narnm  ;  quod  utinam  neque  mors 
solvat,  neque  temporis  longinquitas.  Lamb's  share  of  the 
work  consists  of  eight  sonnets  ;  four  short  fragments  of  blank 
verse,  of  which  the  Grandame  is  the  principal ;  a  poem,  called 
the  Tomb  of  Douglas  ;  some  verses  to  Charles  Lloyd ;  and  a 
Vision  of  Repentance  ;  which  are  all  published  in  the  last  edi- 
tion of  his  poetical  works,  except  one  of  the  sonnets,  which 
was  addressed  to  Mrs.  Siddons  ;  and  the  Tomb  of  Douglas, 
which  was  justly  omitted  as  commonplace  and  vapid.  They 
only  occupy  twenty-eight  duodecimo  pages,  within  which 
space  was  comprised  all  that  Lamb  at  this  time  had  written 
which  he  deemed  worth  preserving. 

The  following  letter  from  Lamb  to  Coleridge  seems  to  have 
been  written  on  receiving  the  first  copy  of  the  work. 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  49 


TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

*•  I  am  sorry  I  cannot  now  relish  your  poetical  present  so 
thoroughly  as  I  feel  it  deserves  ;  but  I  do  not  the  less  thank 
Lloyd  and  you  for  it. 

"  Before  I  offer,  what  alone  I  have  to  offer,  a  few  obvious 
remarks  on  the  poems  you  sent  me,  I  can  but  notice  the  odd  co- 
incidence of  two  young  men,  in  one  age,  carolling  their  grand- 
mothers. Love,  what  L.  calls  the  '  feverish  and  romantic  tie,' 
hath  too  long  domineered  over  all  the  charities  of  home  :  the 
dear  domestic  ties  of  father,  brother,  husband.  The  ami- 
able and  benevolent  Cowper  has  a  beautiful  passage  in  his 
*  Task' — some  natural  and  painful  reflections  on  his  deceased 
parents  ;  and  Hay  ley's  sweet  lines  to  his  mother  are  notori- 
ously the  best  things  he  ever  wrote.  Cowper's  lines,  some 
of  them  are 

'  How  gladly  would  the  man  recall  to  life 
The  boy's  neglected  sire  ;  a  mother  too ! 
<^  That  softer  name,  perhaps  more  gladly  still, 

Might  he  demand  them  at  the  gates  of  death.' 

"  I  cannot  but  smile  to  see  my  granny  so  gayly  decked 
forth ;  though  I  think  whoever  altered  '  thy'  praises  to  '  her' 
praises,  '  thy  honoured  memory  to  '  her'  honoured  memory, 
did  wrong — they  best  expressed  my  feelings.  There  is  a  pen- 
sive state  of  recollection,  in  which  the  mind  is  disposed  to  apos- 
trophize the  departed  objects  of  its  attachment ;  and,  breaking 
loose  from  grammatical  precision,  changes  from  the  first  to  the 
third,  and  from  the  third  to  the  first  person,  just  as  the  random 
fancy  or  the  feeling  directs.  Among  Lloyd's  sonnets,  6th,  7th, 
8th,  9th,  and  1  Ith  are  eminently  beautiful.  I  think  him  too 
lavish  of  his  expletives  ;  the  dos  and  dids^  when  they  occur 
too  often,  bring  a  quaintness  with  them  along  with  their  sim- 
plicity, or  rather  air  of  antiquity,  which  the  patrons  of  them 

seem  desirous  of  conveying. 

«  «  «  *  * 

"  Another  time  I  may  notice  more  particularly  Lloyd's, 
Southey's,  Dermody's  Sonnets.  I  shrink  from  them  now  ; 
my  teazing  lot  makes  me  loo  confused  for  a  clear  judgment  of 
things,  too  selfish  for  sympathy  ;  and  these  ill-digested,  mean- 
ingless remarks  I  have  imposed  on  myself  as  a  task,  to  lull 
reflection  as  well  as  to  show  you  I  did  not  neglect  reading 
your  valuable  present.  Return  my  acknowledgments  to 
Lloyd  ;  you,  too,  seem  to  be  about  realizing  an  Elysium  upon 
earth,  and,  no  doubt,  I  shall  be  happier.      Take  my  best  wishes. 

Remember  me  most  affectionately  to  Mrs.  C ,  and  give 

little  David  Hartley — God   bless    its  little  heart — a  kiss  for 

Vol.  I.— 5  C 


50  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

me.  Bring  him  up  to  know  the  meaning  of  his  Christian 
name,  and  what  that  name  (imposed  upon  him)  will  demand 
of  him. 

"  God  love  you ! 

«  C.  Lamb. 

"  I  write,  for  one  thing,  to  say  that  I  shall  write  no  more 
till  you  send  me  word  where  you  are,  for  you  are  so  soon  to 
move. 

"  My  sister  is  pretty  well,  thank  God.  We  think  of  you 
very  often.  God  bless  you  ;  continue  to  be  my  correspond- 
ent, and  I  will  strive  to  fancy  that  this  world  is  not  '  all  barren- 
ness.' " 

After  several  disappointments,  occasioned  by  the  state  of 
business  at  the  India  House,  Lamb  achieved  his  long-checked 
wish  of  visiting  Coleridge  at  Stowey,  in  company  with  his 
sister,  without  whom  he  felt  it  almost  a  sin  to  enjoy  anything. 
Coleridge,  shortly  after,  abandoned  his  scheme  of  a  cottage- 
life,  and  in  the  following  year  left  England  for  Germany. 
Lamb,  however,  was  not  now  so  lonely  as  when  he  wrote  to 
Coleridge  imploring  his  correspondence  as  the  only  comfort 
of  his  sorrows  and  labours  ;  for,  through  the  instrumentality 
of  Coleridge,  he  was  now  rich  in  friends.  Among  them  he 
marked  George  Dyer,  the  guileless  and  simple-hearted,  whose 
love  of  learning  was  a  passion,  and  who  found,  even  in  the 
forms  of  verse,  objects  of  worship ;  Southey,  in  the  young 
vigour  of  his  genius  ;  and  Wordsworth,  the  great  regenera- 
tor of  English  poetry,  preparing  for  his  long  contest  with  the 
glittering  forms  of  inane  phraseology  which  had  usurped  the 
dominion  of  the  public  mind,  and  with  the  cold  mockeries  of 
scorn  with  which  their  supremacy  was  defended.  By  those 
the  beauty  of  his  character  was  felt ;  the  original  cast  of  his 
powers  was  appreciated  ;  and  his  peculiar  humour  was  detect- 
ed and  kindled  into  fitful  life. 


CORRESPONDENCE    WITH    SOUTHEY.  51 


CHAPTER  IV. 

[1798.] 
Lamb's  Literary  Efforts  and  Correspondence  with  Southey. 

In  the  year  1798,  the  blank  verse  of  Lloyd  and  Lamb,  which 
had  been  contained  in  the  volume  published  in  conjunction 
with  Coleridge,  was,  with  some  additions  by  Lloyd,  published 
in  a  thin  duodecimo,  price  2s.  6d.,  under  the  title  of  "  Blank. 
Verse,  by  Charles  Lloyd  and  Charles  Lamb."  This  unpretend- 
ing book  was  honoured  by  a  brief  and  scornful  notice  in  the  cat- 
alogue of"  The  Monthly  Review,"  in  the  small  print  of  which 
the  works  of  the  poets  who  are  now  recognised  as  the  great- 
est ornaments  of  their  age,  and  who  have  impressed  it  most 
deeply  by  their  genius,  were  usually  named  to  be  dismissed 
with  a  sneer.  After  a  contemptuous  notice  of  "The  Mourn- 
ful Muse"  of  Lloyd,  Lamb  receives  his  quietus  in  a  line  : — 
"  Mr.  Lamb,  the  joint  author  of  this  little  volume,  seems  to  be 
very  properly  associated  with  his  plaintive  companion."* 

In  this  year  Lamb  composed  his  prose  tale,  "  Rosamund 
Gray,"  and  published  it  in  a  volume  of  the  same  size  and  price 
with  the  last,  under  the  title  of  "  A  Tale  of  Rosamund  Gray 
and  Old  Blind  Margaret,"  which,  having  a  semblance  of  story, 
sold  much  better  than  his  poems,  and  added  a  few  pounds  to 
his  slender  income.  This  miniature  romance  is  unique  in 
English  literature.  It  bears  the  impress  of  a  recent  perusal 
of  "  The  Man  of  Feeling"  and  "  Julia  de  Roubigne  ;"  and 
while  on  the  one  hand  it  wants  the  graphic  force  and  delicate 
touches  of  Mackenzie,  it  is  informed  with  deeper  feeling,  and 
breathes  a  diviner  morality  than  the  most  charming  of  his 
tales.  Lamb  never  possessed  the  faculty  of  constructing  a 
plot  either  for  drama  or  novel ;  and  while  he  luxuriated  in 
the  humour  of  Smollett,  the  wit  of  Fielding,  or  the  solemn 
pathos  of  Richardson,  he  was  not  amused,  but  perplexed,  by 
the  attempt  to  tread  the  windings  of  story  which  conducts  to 
their  most  exquisite  passages  through  the  maze  of  adventure. 
In  this  tale,  nothing  is  made  out  with  distinctness,  except  the 
rustic  piety  and  grace  of  the  lovely  girl  and  her  venerable 
grandmother,  which  arc  pictured  with  such  earnestness  and 
simplicity  as  might  beseem  a  fragment  of  the  Book  of  Ruth. 

*  Monthly  Review,  Sept.,  1798. 
C2 


53  CORRESPONDENCE    WITH    SOUTHEY. 

The  villain  who  lays  waste  their  humble  joys  is  a  murky 
phantom  without  individuality  ;  the  events  are  obscured  by 
the  haze  of  sentiment  which  hovers  over  them  ;  and  the  nar- 
rative gives  way  to  the  reflections  of  the  author,  who  is  min- 
gled with  the  persons  of  the  tale  in  visionary  confusion,  and 
gives  to  it  the  character  of  a  sweet  but  disturbed  dream.  It 
has  an  interest  now  beyond  that  of  fiction  ;  for  in  it  we  may 
trace,  "as  in  a  glass  darkly,"  the  characteristics  of  the  mind 
and  heart  of  the  author,  at  a  time  when  a  change  was  coming 
upon  them.  There  are  the  dainty  sense  of  beauty  just  weaned 
from  its  palpable  object,  and  quivering  over  its  lost  images;  feel- 
ing grown  retrospective  before  its  time,  and  tinging  all  things 
with  a  strange  solemnity  ;  hints  of  that  craving  after  immediate 
appliances  which  might  give  impulse  to  a  harassed  frame,  and 
confidence  to  struggling  fancy,  and  of  that  escape  from  the 
pressure  of  agony  into  fantastic  mirth  which,  in  after  life, 
made  Lamb  a  problem  to  a  stranger,  while  they  endeared  him 
a  thousand-fold  to  those  who  really  knew  him.  While  the 
fulness  of  the  religious  sentiments  and  the  scriptural  cast 
of  the  language  still  partake  of  his  early  manhood,  the  visit 
of  the  narrator  of  the  tale  to  the  churchyard  where  his  parents 
lie  buried,  after  his  nerves  had  been  strung  for  the  endeavour 
by  wine  at  the  village  inn,  and  the  half-frantic  jollity  of  his 
old  heart-broken  friend  (the  lover  of  the  tale)  whom  he  met 
there,  with  the  exquisite  benignity  of  thought  breathing  through 
the  whole,  prophesy  the  delightful  peculiarities  and  genial 
frailties  of  an  alter  day.  The  reflections  he  makes  on  the  eu- 
logistic character  of  all  the  inscriptions  are  drawn  from  his 
own  childhood ;  for,  when  a  very  little  boy,  walking  with  his 
sister  in  a  churchyard,  he  suddenly  asked  her,  "  Mary,  where 
do  the  naugJity  people  lie  V 

"Rosamund  Gray"  remained  unreviewed  till  August,  1800, 
when  it  received  the  following  notice  in  "  The  Monthly  Re- 
view's" catalogue,  the  manufacturer  of  which  was  probably 
more  tolerant  of  heterodox  composition  in  prose  than  verse  : 
"  In  the  perusal  of  this  pathetic  and  interesting  story,  the 
reader,  who  has  a  mind  capable  of  enjoying  rational  and  moral 
sentiment,  will  feel  much  gratification.  Mr.  Lamb  has  here 
proved  himself  skilful  in  touching  the  nicest  feelings  of  the  heart, 
and  in  afibrding  great  pleasure  to  the  imagination,  by  exhibit- 
ing events  and  situations  which,  in  the  hands  of  a  writer  less 
conversant  with  the  springs  and  energies  of  the  moral  sense, 
would  make  a  very  *■  sorry  figure.''''^  While  we  acknowledge 
this  scanty  praise  as  a  redeeming  trait  in  the  long  series  of 
critical  absurdities,  we  cannot  help  observing  how  curiously 
piisplaced  all  the  laudatory  epithets  are  ;  the  sentiment  being 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  58 

profound  and  true,  but  not  "  rational.^''  and  the  "  springs  and 
energies  of  the  moral  sense"  being  substituted  for  a  weakness 
which  had  a  power  of  its  own  ! 

Lamb  was  introduced  by  Coleridge  to  Southey  as  early  as 
the  year  1795  ;  but  no  intimacy  ensued  until  he  accompanied 
Lloyd  in  the  summer  of  1797  to  the  little  village  of  Burton, 
near  Christchurch,  in  Hampshire,  where  Southey  was  then 
residing,  and  where  they  spent  a  fortnight  as  the  poet's  guests. 
After  Coleridge's  departure  for  Germany,  in  1798,  a  corre- 
spondence began  between  Lamb  and  Southey  which  continued 
through  that  and  part  of  the  following  year ;  Southey  commu- 
nicates to  Lamb  his  Eclogues,  which  he  was  then  preparing 
for  the  press,  and  Lamb  repays  the  confidence  by  submitting 
the  products  of  his  own  leisure  hours  to  his  genial  critic.  If 
Southey  did  not,  in  all  respects,  compensate  Lamb  for  the  ab- 
sence of  his  earlier  friend,  he  excited  in  him  a  more  entire 
and  active  intellectual  sympathy,  as  the  character  of  Southey's 
mind  bore  more  resemblance  to  his  own  than  that  of  Coleridge. 
In  purity  of  thought ;  in  the  love  of  the  minutest  vestige  of 
antiquity ;  in  a  certain  primness  of  style  bounding  in  the  rich 
humour  which  threatened  to  overflow  it,  they  were  nearly 
akin  ;  both  alike  reverenced  childhood,  and  both  had  preserved 
its  best  attributes  unspotted  from  the  world.  If  Lamb  bowed 
to  the  genius  of  Coleridge  with  a  fonder  reverence,  he  felt 
more  at  home  with  Southey  ;  and  although  he  did  not  pour  out 
the  inmost  secrets  of  his  soul  in  his  letters  to  him  as  to  Cole- 
ridge, he  gave  more  scope  to  the  "  first  sprightly  runnings''  of 
his  humorous  fancy.     Here  is  the  first  of  his  freaks  : — 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  My  tailor  has  brought  me  home  a  new  coat  lapelled,  with 
a  velvet  collar.  He  assures  me  everybody  wears  velvet  col- 
lars now.  Some  are  born  fashionable,  some  achieve  fashion, 
and  others,  like  your  humble  servant,  have  fashion  thrust  upon 
ihem.  The  rogue  has  been  making  inroads  hitherto  by  modest 
degrees,  foisting  upon  me  an  additional  button,  recommending 
gaiters,  but  to  come  upon  me  thus  in  a  full  tide  of  luxury 
neither  becomes  him  as  a  tailor  nor  the  ninth  of  a  man.  My 
meek  gentleman  was  robbed  the  other  day,  coming  with  his 
wife  and  family  in  a  one-horse  shay  from  Hampstead  ;  the  vil- 
lains rifled  him  of  four  guineas,  some  shillings  and  halfpence, 
and  a  bundle  of  customers'  measures,  which  they  swore  were 
bank  notes.  They  did  not  shoot  him,  and  when  they  rode  off 
he  addressed  them  with  profound  gratitude,  making  a  congee  ; 
*  Gentlemen,  I  wish  you  good-night,  and  wo  are  very  much 
obliged  to  you  that  you  have  not  used  us  ill !'  And  this 
5* 


54  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

is  the  cuckoo  that  has  had  the  audacity  to  foist  upon  me  ten 
buttons  on  a  side,  and  a  black  velvet  collar.  A  cursed  ninth 
of  a  scoundrel !" 

****** 

"  When  you  write  to  Lloyd,  he  wishes  his  Jacobin  corre- 
spondents to  address  him  as  Mr.  C.  L." 

The  following  letter — yet  richer  in  fun — bears  date  Satur- 
day, July  28,  1798.  In  order  to  make  its  allusions  intelligible, 
it  is  only  necessary  to  mention  that  Southey  was  then  con- 
templating a  calendar  illustrative  of  the  remarkable  days  of 
the  year. 

TO    MR.  SOUTHEY. 

"  I  am  ashamed  that  I  have  not  thanked  you  before  this  for 
the  '  Joan  of  Arc,'  but  I  did  not  know  your  address,  and  it  did 
not  occur  to  me  to  write  through  Cottle.  The  poem  delighted 
me,  and  the  notes  amused  me  ;  but  methinks  she  of  Neufchatel, 
in  the  print,  holds  her  sword  loo  'like  a  dancer.'  I  sent  your 
notice  to  Phillips,  particularly  requesting  an  immediate  inser- 
tion, but  I  suppose  it  came  too  late.  I  am  sometimes  curious 
to  know  what  progress  you  make  in  that  same  '  Calendar,' 
whether  you  insert  the  nine  worthies  and  Whittington  ;  what 
you  do  or  how  you  can  manage  when  two  saints  meet  and 
quarrel  for  precedency  ;  Marilemas,  and  Candlemas,  and 
Christmas  are  glorious  themes  for  a  writer  like  you,  antiquity- 
bitten,  smitten  with  the  love  of  boars'  heads  and  rosemary  ;  but 
how  you  can  ennoble  the  first  of  April  I  know  not.  By-the- 
way,  I  had  a  thing  to  say,  but  a  certain  false  modesty  has 
hitherto  prevented  me :  perhaps  I  can  best  communicate  my 
wish  by  a  hint — my  birthday  is  on  the  10th  of  February,  new 
style  ;  but  if  it  interferes  with  any  remarkable  event,  why,  rather 
than  my  country  should  lose  her  fame,  I  care  not  if  I  put  my 
nativity  back  eleven  days.  Fine  family  patronage  for  your 
*  Calendar,'  if  that  old  lady  of  prolific  memory  were  living, 
who  lies  (or  lyes)  in  some  church  in  London  (saints  forgive 
me,  but  I  have  forgot  what  church),  attesting  that  enormous 
legend  of  as  many  children  as  days  in  the  year.  I  marvel 
her  impudence  did  not  grasp  at  a  leap  year.  Three  hundred 
and  sixty-five  dedications,  and  all  in  a  family — you  might  spit 
in  spirit  on  the  oneness  of  Mecaenas  patronage  ! 

"  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge,  to  the  eternal  regret  of  his  na- 
tive Devonshire,  emigrates  to  Westphalia.  '  Poor  Lamb  (these 
were  his  last  words),  if  he  wants  any  knowledge,  he  may  apply 
to  me  ;'  in  ordinary  cases  I  thanked  him,  I  have  an  '  Ency- 
clopedia' at  hand ;  but  on  such  an  occasion  as  going  over  to  a 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  5& 

German  university,  I  could  not  refrain  from  sending  him  the 
following  propositions,  to  be  by  him  defended  or  oppugned  (or 
both)  at  Leipsic  or  Gottingen. 

THESES    QU-EDAM    THEOLOGICJE. 
I. 

"  Whether  God  loves  a  lying  angel  better  than  a  true  man  ? 

11. 

"  Whether  the  Archangel  Uriel  could  knowingly  affirm  an 
untruth,  and  whether,  if  he  could,  he  would  ? 

III. 

"  Whether  honesty  be  an  angelic  virtue,  or  not  rather  be- 
longing to  that  class  of  qualities  which  the  schoolmen  term  '  vir- 
tutes  minus  splendidae,  et  hominis  et  terrae  nimis  participesT 

IV. 

•'Whether  the  seraphim  ardentes  do  not  manifest  their 
goodness  by  the  way  of  vision  and  theory  ?  and  whether  prac- 
tice be  not  a  sub-celestial,  and  merely  human  virtue  1 

V. 

"  Whether  the  higher  order  of  seraphim  illuminati  ever 
sneer  1 

VI. 

"  Whether  pure  intelligences  can  ove,  or  whether  they  can 
love  anything  besides  pure  intellect  ? 

VII. 

"  Whether  the  beatific  vision  be  anything  more  or  less  than 
a  perpetual  representment  to  each  individual  angel  of  his  own 
present  attainments  and  future  capabilities,  something  in  the 
manner  of  mortal  looking-glasses  ? 

VIII. 

"  Whether  an  '  immortal  and  amenable  soul'  may  not  come 
to  he  damned  at  last^  and  the  man  never  suspect  it  beforehand  ? 

"  Samuel  Taylor  hath  not  deigned  an  answer ;  was  it  im- 
pertinent in  me  to  avail  myself  of  that  offered  source  of  knowl- 
edge ? 

"  Wishing  Madoc  may  be  born  into  the  world  with  as  splen- 
did promise  as  the  second  birth  or  purification  of  the  Maid 
of  Neufchatel,  I  remain  yours  sincerely, 

"C.  Lamb. 


56  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

*'  I  hope  Edith  is  better ;  my  kindest  remembrances  to  her. 
You  have  a  good  deal  of  trifling  to  forgive  in  this  letter.  Love 
and  respects  to  Cottle." 

The  two  next  fragments  of  letters  to  Southey  illustrate 
strikingly  the  restless  kindness  and  exquisite  spirit  of  allow- 
ance in  Lamb's  nature ;  the  first  an  earnest  pleading  for  a 
poor  fellow  whose  distress  actually  haunted  him ;  the  second 
an  affecting  allusion  to  the  real  goodness  of  a  wild,  untoward 
schoolmate,  and  fine  self-reproval — in  this  instance  how  un- 
merited ! 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  Dear  Southey — Your  friend,  John  May,  has  formerly  made 
kind  offers  to  Lloyd  of  serving  me  in  the  India  House,  by  the 
interest  of  his  friend.  Sir  Francis  Baring.  It  is  not  likely  that 
I  shall  ever  put  his  goodness  to  the  test  on  my  own  account, 
for  my  prospects  are  very  comfortable.  But  I  know  a  man,  a 
young  man,  whom  he  could  serve  through  the  same  channel, 
and,  I  think,  would  be  disposed  to  serve  if  he  were  acquaint- 
ed with  his  case.  This  poor  fellow  (whom  I  know  just 
enough  of  to  vouch  for  his  strict  integrity  and  worth)  has  lost 
two  or  three  employments  from  illness  which  he  cannot  re- 
gain ;  he  was  once  insane,  and,  from  the  distressful  uncer- 
tainty of  his  livelihood,  has  reason  to  apprehend  a  return  of 
that  malady.  He  has  been  for  some  time  dependant  on  a 
woman,  whose  lodger  he  formerly  was,  but  who  can  ill  afford 
to  maintain  him ;  and  I  know  that  on  Christmas  night  last  he 
actually  walked  about  the  streets  all  night  rather  than  accept 
of  her  bed,  which  she  offered  him,  and  offered  herself  to 
sleep  in  the  kitchen;  and  that,  in  consequence  of  that  severe 
cold,  he  is  labouring  under  a  bilious  disorder,  besides  a  de- 
pression of  spirits,  which  incapacitates  him  from  exertion 
when  he  most  needs  it.  For  God's  sake,  Southey,  if  it  does 
not  go  against  you  to  ask  favours,  do  it  now ;  ask  it  as  for  me  ; 
but  do  not  do  a  violence  to  your  feelings,  because  he  does  not 
know  of  this  application,  and  will  suffer  no  disappointment. 
What  I  meant  to  say  was  this — there  are  in  the  India  House 
what  are  called  extra  clerks^  not  on  the  establishment  like  me, 
but  employed  in  extra  business,  by-jobs  ;  these  get  about  £50 
a  year,  or  rather  more,  but  never  rise  ;  a  director  can  put  in 
at  any  time  a  young  man  in  this  office,  and  it  is  by  no  means 
considered  so  great  a  favour  as  making  an  established  clerk. 
He  would  think  himself  as  rich  as  an  emperor  if  he  could  get 
such  a  certain  situation,  and  be  relieved  from  those  disquie- 
tudes which,  I  do  fear,  may  one  day  bring  back  his  distemper. 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  57 

**  You  know  John  May  better  than  I  do,  but  I  know  enough 
to  believe  that  he  is  a  good  man  ;  he  did  make  me  that  offer 
I  have  mentioned,  but  you  will  perceive  that  such  an  offer 
cannot  authorize  me  in  applying  for  another  person. 

"  But  I  cannot  help  writing  to  you  on  the  subject,  for  the 
young  man  is  perpetually  before  my  eyes,  and  I  shall  feel  it 
a  crime  not  to  strain  all  my  petty  interest  to  do  him  service, 
though  I  put  my  own  delicacy  to  the  question  by  so  doing.  I 
have  made  one  other  unsuccessful  attempt  already  ;  at  all 
events,  I  will  thank  you  to  write,  for  I  am  tormented  with 

anxiety. 

*  *  *  *  *  *  . 

"  Poor  !    1  am  afraid  the   world,  and  the  camp,  and 

the  university  have  spoiled  him  among  them.  'Tis  certain 
he  had  at  one  time  a  strong  capacity  of  turning  out  something 
better.  I  knew  him,  and  that  not  long  since,  when  he  had  a 
most  warm  heart.  I  am  asliamed  of  the  indifference  I  have 
sometimes  felt  towards  him.  I  think  the  devil  is  in  one's 
heart.  I  am  under  obligations  to  that  man  for  the  warmest 
friendship  and  heartiest  sympathy,  even  for  an  agony  of  sym- 
pathy expressed  both  by  word,  and  deed,  and  tears  for  me, 
when  I  was  in  my  greatest  distress.  But  I  have  forgot  that ! 
as,  I  fear,  he  has  nigh  forgot  the  awful  scenes  which  were  be- 
fore his  eyes  when  he  served  the  office  of  a  comforter  to  me. 
No  service  was  too  mean  or  troublesome  for  him  to  perform. 
I  can't  think  what  but  the  devil,  '  that  old  spider,'  could  have 
sucked  my  heart  so  dry  of  its  sense  of  all  gratitude.  If  he 
does  come  in  your  way,  Southey,  fail  not  to  tell  him  that  I  re- 
tain a  most  affectionate  remembrance  of  his  old  friendliness, 
and  an  earnest  wish  to  resume  our  intercourse.  In  this  I  am 
serious.  I  cannot  recommend  him  to  your  society,  because  I 
am  afraid  whether  he  be  quite  worthy  of  it.  But  I  have  no 
right  to  dismiss  him  from  my  regard.  He  was  at  one  time, 
and  in  the  worst  of  times,  my  own  familiar  friend,  and  great 
comfort  to  me  then.  1  have  known  him  to  play  at  cards  with 
my  father,  meal  times  excepted,  literally  all  day  long,  in  long 
days  too,  to  save  me  from  being  teazcd  by  the  old  man  when 
I  was  not  able  to  bear  it. 

*'  God  bless  him  for  it,  and  God  bless  you,  JSouthey. 
****** 

"C.  L." 

Lamb  now  began  to  write  the  tragedy  of  John  Woodvil. 
His  admiration  of  the  dramatists  of  Elizabeth's  age  was  yet 
young,  and  had  some  of  the  indiscretion  of  an  early  love  ;  but 
there  was  nothing  affected  in  the  antique  cast  of  his  language, 

(;  3 


58  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

or  the  frequent  roughness  of  his  verse.  His  delicate  sense  of 
beauty  had  found  a  congenial  organ  in  the  style  which  he 
tasted  with  rapture  ;  and  criticism  gave  him  little  encourage- 
ment to  adapt  it  to  the  frigid  insipidities  of  the  time.  "  My 
tragedy,"  says  he,  in  the  first  letter  to  Southey  which  alludes 
to  the  play,  "  will  be  a  medley  (I  intend  it  to  be  a  medley)  of 
laughter  and  tears,  prose  and  verse,  and,  in  some  places, 
rhyme  ;  songs,  wit,  pathos,  humour  ;  and,  if  possible,  sublim- 
ity ;  at  least,  'tis  not  a  fault  in  my  intention  if  it  does  not  com- 
prehend most  of  these  discordant  atoms  :  Heaven  send  they 
dance  not  the  dance  of  death  !"  In  another  letter  he  there  in- 
troduces the  delicious  rhymed  passage  in  the  "  Forest  Scene," 
which  Godwin,  having  accidentally  seen  quoted,  took  for  a 
choice  fragment  of  some  old  dramatist,  and  went  to  Lamb  to 
assist  him  in  finding  the  author. 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  I  just  send  you  a  few  rhymes  from  my  play,  the  only 
rhymes  in  it.  A  forest-liver  giving  an  account  of  his  amuse- 
ments. 

*  What  sports  have  you  m  the  forest  ? 

Not  many — some  few — as  thus  : 

To  see  the  sun  to  bed,  and  see  him  rise, 

Like  some  hot  amourist  with  glowing  eyes, 

Bursting  the  lazy  bands  of  sleep  that  bound  him  ; 

With  all  his  fires  and  travelling  glories  round  him  : 

Sometimes  the  moon  on  soft  night-clouds  to  rest, 

Like  beauty  nestling  in  a  young  man's  breast. 

And  all  the  winking  stars,  her  handmaids,  keep 

Admiring  silence,  while  those  lovers  sleep  : 

Sometimes  outstretch'd  in  very  idleness. 

Naught  doing,  saying  little,  thinking  less, 

To  view  the  leaves,  thin  dancers  upon  air. 

Go  eddying  round  ;  and  small  birds  how  they  fare, 

When  mother  autumn  fills  their  beaks  with  corn, 

Filch'd  from  the  careless  Amathea's  horn ; 

And  how  the  woods  berries  and  worms  provide, 

Without  their  pains,  when  earth  hath  naught  beside 

To  answer  their  small  wants  ; 

To  view  the  graceful  deer  come  trooping  by. 

Then  pause,  and  gaze,  then  turn  they  know  not  why. 

Like  bashful  younkers  in  society  ; 

To  mark  the  structure  of  a  plant  or  tree  ; 

And  all  fair  things  of  earth,  how  fair  they  be  !'  &c.,  &c. 

"  I  love  to  anticipate  charges  of  unoriginality  :  the  first  line 
is  almost  Shakspeare's  : — 

'To  have  my  love  to  bed  and  to  arise.' 

Midsummer^ s  Nighfs  Dream. 

"  I  think  there  is  a  sweetness  in  the  versification  not  unlike 
some  rhymes  in  that  exquisite  play,  and  the  last  line  but  three 
is  yours : — 


I 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  59 

'  An  eye, 
That  met  the  gaze,  or  turn'd  it  knew  not  why.' 

Rosamund's  Epistle. 

"  I  shall  anticipate  all  my  play,  and  have  nothing  to  show 
you.  An  idea  for  Leviathan — commentators  on  Job  have 
been  puzzled  to  find  out  a  meaning  for  Leviathan — 'tis  a 
whale,  say  some  ;  a  crocodile,  say  others.  In  my  simple  con- 
jecture, Leviathan  is  neither  more  nor  less   than  the  Lord 

Mayor  of  London  for  the  time  being." 

m  *  *  *  *  * 

He  seems  also  to  have  sent,  about  this  time,  the  solemnly  fan- 
tastic poem  of  the  "  Witch,"  as  the  following  passage  relates 
to  one  of  its  conceits  : — 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  Your  recipe  for  a  Turk's  poison  is  invaluable,  and  truly 
Marlowish.  Lloyd  objects  to  '  shutting  up  the  womb  of  his 
purse'  in  my  curse  (which,  for  a  Christian  witch  in  a  Chris- 
tian country,  is  not  too  mild,  I  hope) ;  do  you  object?  I  think 
there  is  a  strangeness  in  the  idea,  as  well  as  '  shaking  the 
poor  like  snakes  from  his  door,'  which  suits  the  speaker. 
Witches  illustrate,  as  fine  ladies  do,  from  their  own  familiar 
objects,  and  snakes  and  shutting  up  of  wombs  are  in  their  way. 
I  don't  know  that  this  last  charge  has  been  before  brought 
against  'em,  nor  either  the  sour  milk  or  the  mandrake  babe  ; 
but  I  affirm  these  be  things  a  witch  would  do  if  she  could." 

Here  is  a  specimen  of  Lamb's  criticism  on  Southey's  poet- 
ical communications. 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  I  have  read  your  Eclogue  repeatedly,  and  cannot  call  it 
bald  or  without  interest  ;  the  cast  of  it  and  the  design  are 
completely  original,  and  may  set  people  upon  thinking  :  it  is 
as  poetical  as  the  subject  requires,  which  asks  no  poetry  ;  but 
it  is  defective  in  pathos.  The  woman's  own  story  is  the 
tamest  part  of  it;  I  should  like  you  to  remould  that;  it  too 
much  resembles  the  young  maid's  history  ;  both  had  been  in 
service.  Even  the  omission  would  not  injure  the  poem  ;  after 
the  words  '  growing  wants'  you  nii^ht,  not  unconnectedly, 
introduce  '  look  at  that  little  chub'  down  to  '  welcome  one  ;' 
and,  decidedly,  I  would  have  you  end  it  somehow  thus,  '  Give 
them,  at  least  this  evening,  a  good  meal  (gives  her  money) ; 
now,  fare  thee  well :  hereafter  you  have  taught  me  to  give 
sad  meaning  to  the  village-bells,'  «fcc.,  which  would  leave  a 
stronger  impression    (as  well  as  more  pleasingly  recall  the 


60  LETTEKS    TO    SOUTIIEY. 

beginning  of  the  Eclogue)  than  the  present  commonplace  ref- 
erence to  a  better  world,  which  the  woman  '  must  have  heard 
at  church.'  I  should  like  you,  too,  a  good  deal  to  enlarge  the 
most  striking  part,  as  it  might  have  been,  of  the  poem — '  Is  it 
idleness  V  &c.,  that  affords  a  good  field  for  dwelling  on  sick- 
ness, and  inabilities,  and  old  age.  And  you  might  also  a  good 
deal  enrich  the  piece -with  a  picture  of  a  country  wedding  :  the 
woman  might  very  well,  in  a  transient  fit  of  oblivion,  dwell  upon 
the  ceremony  and  circumstances  of  her  own  nuptials  six  years 
ago,  the  snugness  of  the  bridegroom,  the  feastings,  the  cheap 
merriment,  the  welcomings,  and  the  secret  envyings  of  the 
maidens — then,  dropping  all  this,  recur  to  her  present  lot.  I 
do  not  know  that  I  can  suggest  anything  else,  or  that  I  have 
suggested  anything  new  or  material.  I  shall  be  very  glad  to 
see  some  more  poetry,  though,  I  fear,  your  trouble  in  tran- 
scribing will  be  greater  than  the  service  my  remarks  may  do 
them. 
^^  y_  "  Yours  affectionately, 

VV  "C.Lamb. 

'"  I  cut  my  letter  short  because  I  am  called  off  to  business." 

The  following,  of  the  same  character,  is  further  interesting, 
as  tracing  the  origin  of  his  "  Rosamund,"  and  exhibiting  his 
young  enthusiasm  for  the  old  English  drama  so  nobly  devel- 
oped in  his  "  Specimens  :" — 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

**  Dear  Southey — I  thank  you  heartily  for  the  Eclogue  ;  it 
pleases  me  mightily,  being  so  full  of  picture-work  and  circum- 
stances. I  find  no  fault  in  it,  unless,  perhaps,  that  Joanna's 
ruin  is  a  catastrophe  too  trite  :  and  this  is  not  the  first  or  sec- 
ond time  you  have  clothed  your  indignation,  in  verse,  in  a  tale 
of  ruined  innocence.  The  old  lady,  spinning  in  the  sun,  I 
hope,  would  not  disdain  to  claim  some  kindred  with  old  Mar- 
garet. I  could  almost  wish  you  to  vary  some  circumstances 
in  the  conclusion.  A  gentleman  seducer  has  often  been  de- 
scribed in  prose  and  verse  ;  what  if  you  had  accomplished 
Joanna's  ruin  by  the  clumsy  arts  and  rustic  gifts  of  some  coun- 
try fellow  ?     I  am  thinking,  I  believe,  of  the  song, 

'  An  old  woman  clothed  in  gray, 

Whose  daughter  was  charming  and  young, 
And  she  was  deluded  away 

By  Roger's  false  flattering  tongue.' 

A  Roger-Lothario  would  be  a  novel  character ;  I  think  you 
might  paint  him  very  well.  You  may  think  this  a  very  silly 
suggestion,  and  so  indeed  it  is  ;  but,  in  good  truth,  nothing  else 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHED'.  61 

but  the  tirst  words  of  that  foolish  ballad  put  me  upon  scribbling 
my  *  Rosamund.'  But  I  thank  you  heartily  for  the  poem. 
Not  having  anything  of  my  own  to  send  you  in  return — though, 
to  tell  truth,  I  am  at  work  upon  something,  which,  if  I  were  to 
cut  away  and  garble,  perhaps  I  might  send  you  an  extract  or 
two  that  might  not  displease  you  ;  but  I  will  not  do  that ;  and 
whether  it  will  come  to  anything,  I  know  not,  for  I  am  as 
slow  as  a  Fleming  painter  when  I  compose  anything — I  will 
crave  leave  to  put  down  a  few  lines  of  old  Christopher  Mar- 
low's  ;  I  take  them  from  his  tragedy,  '  The  Jew  of  Malta.' 
The  Jew  is  a  famous  character,  quite  out  of  nature  ;  but,  when 
we  consider  the  terrible  idea  our  simple  ancestors  had  of  a 
Jew,  not  more  to  be  discommended  for  a  certain  discolouring 
(I  think  Addison  calls  it)  than  the  witches  and  fairies  of  Mar- 
low's  mighty  successor.  The  scene  is  between  Barabas,  the 
Jew,  and  Ithamore,  a  Turkish  captive,  exposed  to  sale  for  a 
slave. 

BARABAS. 

(A  precious  rascal.) 

'  As  for  myself,  I  walk  abroad  a  nights, 
And  kill  sick  people  groaning  under  walls  ; 
Sometimes  I  go  about,  and  poison  wells  ; 
And  now  and  then,  to  cherish  Christian  thieves, 
1  am  content  to  lose  some  of  my  crowns, 
That  I  may,  walking  in  my  gallery, 
See  'm  go  pinion'd  along  by  my  door. 
Being  young,  I  studied  physic,  and  began 
To  practise  first  upon  the  Italian  : 
There  I  enrich'd  the  priests  with  burials, 
And  always  kept  the  se.xton's  arms  in  use 
With  digging  graves,  and  ringing  dead  men's  knells  ; 
And,  after  that,  was  I  an  engineer, 
And  in  the  wars  'tween  P'rance  and  Germany, 
Under  pretence  of  serving  Charles  the  Fifth, 
Slew  friend  and  enemy  with  my  stratagems. 
Then  after  that  was  I  a  usurer. 
And  with  extorting,  cozening,  forfeiting. 
And  tricks  belongii)g  unto  brokery, 
I  fill'd  the  jail  with  bankrupts  in  a  year. 
And  with  young  orphans  planted  hospitals, 
And  every  moon  made  some  or  other  mad  , 
And  now  and  then  one  hang  himself  for  grief, 
Pinning  upon  his  breast  a  long  great  scroll, 
How  I  with  interest  had  tormented  him.' 

(Now  hear  Ithamore,  the  other  gentle  nature.) 

ITHAMORE. 

{A  comical  dog.) 

*  Faith,  master,  and  I  have  spent  my  time 
In  setting  Christian  villages  on  fire, 
Chaining  of  eunuchs,  binding  galley-slaves. 
One  time  I  was  an  hostler  in  an  inn, 


62  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

And  in  the  nighttime  secretly  would  I  steal 

To  travellers'  chambers,  and  there  cut  their  throats. 

Once  at  Jerusalem,  where  the  pilgrims  kneel'd, 

I  strew'd  powder  on  the  marble  stones, 

And  therewithal  their  knees  would  rankle  so, 

That  I  have  laugh'd  a  good  to  see  the  cripples 

Go  limping  home  to  Christendom  on  stilts  ' 

BARABAS. 

'  Why,  this  is  something—' 

"  There  is  a  mixture  of  the  ludicrous  and  the  terrible  in 
these  lines,  brimful  of  genius  and  antique  invention,  that  at 
first  reminded  me  of  your  old  description  of  cruelty  in  hell. 

"  I  am  glad  you  have  put  me  on  the  scent  after  old  Quarles. 
If  I  do  not  put  up  those  eclogues,  and  that  shortly,  say  I  am 
no  true-nosed  hound." 

The  following  letters,  vt^hich  must  have  been  written  after 
a  short  interval,  show  a  rapid  change  of  opinion,  very  unusual 
with  Lamb  (who  stuck  to  his  favourite  books  as  he  did  to  his 
friends),  as  to  the  relative  merits  of  the  "  Emblems"  of  Wither, 
and  of  Quarles : — 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

*'  I  perfectly  accord  with  your  opinion  of  old  Wither ;  Quarles 
is  a  wittier  writer,  but  Wither  lays  more  hold  of  the  heart. 
Quarles  thinks  of  his  audience  when  he  lectures ;  Wither 
soliloquizes  in  company  from  a  full  heart.  What  wretched 
stuff  are  the  'Divine  Fancies'  of  Quarles  !  Religion  appears 
to  him  no  longer  valuable  than  it  furnishes  matter  for  quibbles 
and  riddles  ;  he  turns  God's  grace  into  wantonness.  Wither  is 
like  an  old  friend,  whose  warm-heartedness  and  estimable  qual- 
ities make  us  wish  he  possessed  more  genius,  but  at  the  same 
time  make  us  willing  to  dispense  with  that  want.  I  always 
love  W.,  and  sometimes  admire  Q.  Still  that  portrait  poem  is 
a  fine  one  ;  and  the  extract  from  '  Shepherds'  Hunting'  places 
him  in  a  starry  height  far  above  Quarles.  If  you  wrote  that 
review  in  '  Grit.  Rev.,'  I  am  sorry  you  are  so  sparing  of  praise 
to  the  Ancient  Marinere  ;  so  far  from  calling  it  as  you  do,  with 
some  wit,  but  more  severity,  '  A  Dutch  attempt,'  &c.,  I  call  it 
a  right  English  attempt,  and  a  successful  one,  to  dethrone 
German  sublimity.  You  have  selected  a  passage  fertile  in 
unmeaning  miracles,  but  have  passed  by  fifty  passages  as  mi- 
raculous as  the  miracles  they  celebrate.  I  never  so  deeply 
felt  the  pathetic  as  in  that  part, 

'A  spring  of  love  gush'd  from  my  heart, 
Ana  I  bless'd  them  unaware' — 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  63 

It  stung  me  into  high  pleasure  through  sufferings.  Lloyd  does 
not  like  it ;  his  head  is  too  metaphysical,  and  your  taste  too 
correct ;  at  least  I  must  allege  something  against  you  both  to 
excuse  my  own  dotage — 

*  So  lonely  'twas  that  God  himself 
Scarce  seemed  there  to  be  !  !'  6ic.,  &c. 

But  you  allow  some  elaborate  beauties  ;  you  should  have  ex- 
tracted 'em.  '  The  Ancient  Marinere'  play  smore  tricks  with 
the  mind  than  that  last  poem,  which  is  yet  one  of  the  finest 
written.  But  I  am  getting  too  dogmatical ;  and,  before  1  degen- 
erate into  abuse,  I  will  conclude  with  assuring  you  that  I  am 

"  Sincerely  yours, 

"C.  Lamb. 

"  I  am  going  to  meet  Lloyd  at  Ware,  on  Saturday,  to  return 
on  Sunday.  Have  you  any  commands  or  commendations  to 
the  metaphysician  ?  I  shall  be  very  happy  if  you  will  dine  or 
spend  any  time  with  me  in  your  way  through  the  great  ugly 
city  ;  but  I  know  you  have  other  ties  upon  you  in  these  parts. 

"  Love  and  respects  to  Edith,  and  friendly  remembrances  to 
Cottle." 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  Dear  Southey — I  have  at  last  been  so  fortunate  as  to  pick 
up  Wither's  Emblems  for  you,  that  '  old  book  and  quaint,'  as 
the  brief  author  of  Rosamund  Gray  hath  it ;  it  is  in  a  most  de- 
testable state  of  preservation,  and  the  cuts  are  of  a  fainter  im- 
pression than  I  have  seen.  Some  child,  the  curse  of  antiqua- 
ries and  bane  of  bibliopical  rarities,  hath  been  dabbling  in 
some  of  them  with  its  paint  and  dirty  fingers  ;  and,  in  particu- 
lar, hath  a  little  sullied  the  author's  own  portraiture,  which  I 
think  valuable,  as  the  poem  that  accompanies  it  is  no  common 
one,  this  last  excepted  ;  the  Emblems  are  far  inferior  to  old 
Quarles.  I  once  told  you  otherwise,  but  I  had  not  then  read 
old  Q.  with  attention.  I  have  picked  up,  too,  another  copy  of 
Quarles  for  ninepence  !  !  !  O  tempora !  O  lectores  !  so  that, 
if  you  have  lost  or  parted  with  your  own  copy,  say  so,  and 
I  can  furnish  you,  for  you  prize  these  things  more  than  I 
do.  You  will  be  amused,  I  think,  with  honest  Wither's  '  Su- 
persedeas to  all  them  whose  custom  it  is,  without  any  deserv- 
ing, to  importune  authors  to  give  unto  them  their  books.'  I  am 
sorry  'tis  imperfect,  as  the  lottery  board  annexed  to  it  also  is. 
Methinks  you  might  modernize  and  elegantize  the  Superse- 
deas, and  place  it  in  front  of  your  Joan  of  Arc,  as  a  gentle  hint 

to  Messrs.  P ,  <fec.     One  of  the  happiest  emblems  and 

comicalest  cuts  is  the  owl  and  little  chirpers,  page  63. 

"Wishing  you  all  amusement,  which  your  true  emblem- 


64  LETTERS    TO    SOU THEY. 

fancier  can  scarce  fail  to  find  in  even  bad  emblems,  I  remain 
your  caterer  to  command, 

"  C.  Lamb. 
*'  Love  and  respects  to  Edith.     I  hope  she  is  well.     Hovir 
does  your  Calendar  prosper?" 

In  this  year  Mr.  Cottle  proposed  to  publish  an  annual  vol- 
ume of  fugitive  poetry  by  various  hands,  under  the  title  of  the 
"  Annual  Anthology  ;"  to  which  Coleridge  and  Southey  were 
principal  contributors,  the  first  volume  of  which  was  published 
in  the  following  year.  To  this  little  work  Lamb  contributed 
a  short  religious  effusion  in  blank  verse,  entitled  "  Living 
without  God  in  the  World."  The  following  letter  to  Southey 
refers  to  this  poem  by  its  first  words,  "  Mystery  of  God,"  and 
recurs  to  the  rejected  sonnet  to  his  sister ;  and  alludes  to  an 
intention,  afterward  changed,  of  entitling  the  proposed  collec- 
tion "  Gleanings." 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  I  can  have  no  objection  to  your  printing  '  Mystery  of 
God'  with  my  name,  and  all  due  acknowledgments  for  the 
honour  and  favour  of  the  communication  ;  indeed,  'tis  a  poem 
that  can  dishonour  no  name.  Now  that  is  in  the  true  strain 
of  modern  modesto-vanitas.  .  .  But  for  the  sonnet,  I  heart- 
ily wish  it,  as  I  thought  it  was,  dead  and  forgotten.  If  the  ex- 
act circumstances  under  which  I  wrote  could  be  known  or 
told,  it  would  be  an  interesting  sonnet  ;  but,  to  an  indifferent 
and  stranger  reader,  it  must  appear  a  very  bald  thing,  certain- 
ly inadmissible  in  a  compilation.  I  wish  you  could  affix  a 
different  name  to  the  volume  ;  there  is  a  contemptible  book,  a 
wretched  assortment  of  vapid  feelings,  entitled  '■Pratt's  Glean- 
ings^^ which  hath  damned  and  impropriated  the  title  for  ever. 
Pray  think  of  some  other.  The  gentleman  is  better  known 
(better  had  he  remained  unknown)  by  an  Ode  to  Benevolence, 
written  and  spoken  for  and  at  the  annual  dinner  of  the  Hu- 
mane Society,  who  walk  in  procession  once  a  year,  with  all 
the  objects  of  their  charity  before  them,  to  return  God  thanks 
for  giving  them  such  benevolent  hearts." 


At  this  time  Lamb's  most  intimate  associates  were  Lloyd 
and  Jem  White,  the  author  of  the  Falstaff  Letters.  When 
Lloyd  was  in  town,  he  and  White  lodged  in  the  same  house, 
and  were  fast  friends,  though  no  two  men  could  be  more  un- 
like, Lloyd  having  no  drollery  in  his  nature,  and  White  nothing 
else.     "  You  will  easily  understand,"  observes  Mr.  Southey, 


ATTACKS    OF    THE    ANTI-JACOBIJN.  65" 

in  a  letter  with  which  he  favoured  the  publisher,  "  how  Lamb 
could  sympathize  with  both," 

The  literary  association  of  Lamb  with  Coleridge  and  Southey 
drew  down  upon  him  the  hostility  of  the  young  scorners  of  the 
"  Anti-Jacobin,"  who,  luxuriating  in  boyish  pride  and  aristocratic 
patronage,  tossed  the  arrows  of  their  wit  against  all  charged 
with  innovation,  whether  in  politics  or  poetry,  and  cared  little 
whom  they  wounded.  No  one  could  be  more  iimocent  than 
Lamb  of  political  heresy;  no  one  more  strongly  opposed  to  new 
theories  in  morality,  which  he  always  regarded  with  disgust ; 
and  yet  he  not  only  shared  in  the  injustice  which  accused  his 
friends  of  the  last,  but  was  confounded  in  the  charge  of  the 
first,  his  only  crime  being  that  he  had  published  a  few  poems 
deeply  coloured  with  religious  enthusiasm,  in  conjunction 
with  two  other  men  of  genius,  who  were  dazzled  by  the  glow- 
ing phantoms  which  the  French  revolution  had  raised.  The 
very  first  number  of  the  "  Anti-Jacobin  Magazine  and  Review" 
was  adorned  by  a  caricature  of  Gilray's,  in  which  Coleridge 
and  Southey  were  introduced  with  asses'  heads,  and  Lloyd 
and  Lamb  as  toad  and  frog.  In  the  number  for  July  appeared 
the  well-known  poem  of  the  "  New  Morality,"  in  which  all 
the  prominent  objects  of  the  hatred  of  these  champions  of  re- 
ligion and  order  were  introduced  as  offering  homage  to  Le- 
paux,  a  French  charlatan,  of  whose  existence  Lamb  had  never 
even  heard, 

"  Couriers  and  Stars,  sedition's  evening  host, 
Thou  Morning  Chronicle  and  Morning  Post, 
Whether  ye  make  the  '  Rights  of  Man'  your  theme, 
Your  country  hbel,  and  your  God  blaspheme, 
Or  dirt  on  private  worth  and  virtue  throw, 
Still  blasphemous  or  blackguard,  praise  Lepaux. 

And  ye  five  other  wand'ring  bards  that  move 

In  sweet  accord  of  harmony  and  love, 

C dge  and  S — th — y,  L— d,  and  L — b,  &  Co., 

"^J'une  all  your  mystic  harps  to  praise  Lepaux  !" 

Not  content  with  thus  confounding  persons  of  the  most  op- 
posite opinions  and  the  most  various  characters  in  one  com- 
mon libel,  the  party  returned  to  the  charge  in  the  number  for 
September,  and  thus  denounced  the  young  poets,  in  a  parody 
on  the  *'  Ode  to  the  Passions,"  under  the  title  of  "  The  Anar- 
chists." 

"  Next  H — Ic — ft  vow'd,  in  doleful  tone. 
No  more  to  firo  a  th;ink!»;ss  age  ; 
Oblivion  mark'd  hiH  labours  for  her  own, 

Neglected  from  the  press,  and  damn'd  upon  the  stage. 

See  !  faithful  to  their  mighty  dam, 

C dge,  S— th— V.  L— d,  and  L— b 

6* 


66  INTRODUCTION    TO    GODWIN. 

In  splay-foot  madrigals  of  love, 

Soft  moaning  like  the  widow'd  dove, 

Pour,  side  by  side,  their  sympathetic  notes ; 

Of  equal  rights,  and  civic  feasts, 
And  tyrant  kings,  and  knavish  priests, 
Swift  through  the  land  the  tuneful  mischief  floats. 
And  now  to  softer  strains  they  struck  the  lyre, 
They  sung  the  beetle  or  the  mole. 
The  dying  kid,  or  ass's  foal, 
By  cruel  man  permitted  to  expire." 

These  effusions  have  the  palliation  which  the  excess  of 
sportive  wit,  impelled  by  youthful  spirits,  and  fostered  by  the 
applause  of  the  great,  brings  with  it ;  but  it  will  be  difficult  to 
palliate  the  coarse  malignity  of  a  passage  in  the  prose  de- 
partment of  the  same  work,  in  which  the  writer  added  to  a 
statement  that  Mr.  Coleridge  was  dishonoured  at  Cambridge 
for  preaching  Deism  :  "  Since  then  he  has  left  his  native 
country,  commenced  citizen  of  the  world,  left  his  poor  chil- 
dren fatherless,  and  his  wife  destitute.  Ex  his  disce^  his  friends 
Lamb  and  Southey."  It  was  surely  rather  too  much,  even  for 
partisans,  when  denouncing  their  political  opponents  as  men 
who  "  dirt  on  private  worth  and  virtue  threw,"  thus  to  slander 
two  young  men  of  the  most  exemplary  character — one  of  an 
almost  puritanical  exactness  of  demeanour  and  conduct,  and 
the  other  persevering  in  a  life  of  noble  self-sacrifice,  checkered 
only  by  the  frailties  of  a  sweet  nature,  which  endeared  him 
even  to  those  who  were  not  admitted  to  the  intimacy  necessary 
to  appreciate  the  touching  example  of  his  severer  virtues  ! 

If  Lamb's  acquaintance  with  Coleridge  and  Southey  pro- 
cured for  him  the  scorn  of  the  more  virulent  of  the  Anti-Ja- 
cobin party,  he  showed,  by  his  intimacy  with  another  distin- 
guished object  of  their  animosity,  that  he  was  not  solicitous  to 
avert  it.  He  was  introduced  by  Mr.  Coleridge  to  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  persons  of  that  stirring  time — the  author  of 
"  Caleb  Williams"  and  of  the  "  Political  Justice."  The  first 
meeting  between  Lamb  and  Godwin  did  not  wear  a  promising 
aspect.  Lamb  grew  warm  as  the  conviviality  of  the  evening 
advanced,  and  indulged  in  some  freaks  of  humour  which  had 
not  been  dreamed  of  in  Godwin's  philosophy ;  and  the  phi- 
lospher,  forgetting  the  equanimity  with  which  he  usually  looked 
on  the  vicissitudes  of  the  world  or  the  whist-table,  broke  into 
an  allusion  to  Gilray's  caricature,  and  asked,  "  Mr.  Lamb,  are 
you  both  toad  and  frog?''''  Coleridge  was  apprehensive  of  a 
rupture  ;  but,  calling  the  next  morning  on  Lamb,  he  found  God- 
win seated  at  breakfast  with  him  ;  and  an  interchange  of  ci- 
vilities and  card-parties  was  established,  which  lasted  through 
the  life  of  Lamb,  whom  Godwin  only  survived  a  few  months. 
Indifferent  altogether  to  the  politics  of  the  age,  Lamb  could 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  67 

not  help  being  struck  with  productions  of  its  newborn  ener- 
gies, so  remarkable  as  the  works  and  the  character  of  God- 
win. He  seemed  to  realize  in  himself  what  Wordsworth  long 
afterward  described,  "  the  central  calm  at  the  heart  of  all  agi- 
tation." Through  the  medium  of  his  mind  the  stormy  con- 
vulsions of  society  were  seen  "  silent  as  in  a  picture."  Para- 
doxes the  most  daring  wore  the  air  of  deliberate  wisdom  as  he 
pronounced  them.  He  foretold  the  future  happiness  of  man- 
kind, not  with  the  inspiration  of  the  poet,  but  with  the  grave 
and  passionless  voice  of  the  oracle.  There  was  nothing  better 
calculated  at  once  to  feed  and  to  make  steady  the  enthusiasm 
of  youthful  patriots  than  the  high  speculations  in  which  he 
taught  them  to  engage  on  the  nature  of  social  evils  and  the 
great  destiny  of  his  species.  No  one  would  have  suspected 
the  author  of  those  wild  theories,  which  startled  the  wise  and 
shocked  the  prudent,  in  the  calm,  gentlemanly  person  who 
rarely  said  anything  above  the  most  gentle  commonplace,  and 
took  interest  in  little  beyond  the  whist-table.  His  peculiar 
opinions  were  entirely  subservient  to  his  love  of  letters.  He 
thought  any  man  who  had  written  a  book  had  attained  a  su- 
periority over  his  fellows  which  placed  him  in  another  class, 
and  could  scarcely  understand  other  distinctions.  Of  all  his 
works  Lamb  liked  his  "  Essay  on  Sepulchres"  the  best — a 
short  development  of  a  scheme  for  preserving  in  one  place  the 
memory  of  all  great  writers  deceased,  and  assigning  to  each 
his  proper  station — quite  chimerical  in  itself,  but  accompanied 
with  solemn  and  touching  musmgs  on  life,  and  death,  and  fame, 
imbodied  in  a  style  of  singular  refinement  and  beauty. 


CHAPTER  V. 

^  [1799,  1800.] 

Letters  to  Southey,  Coleridge,  Manning,  and  Wordsworth. 

The  year  1799  found  Lamb  engaged  during  his  leisure 
hours  in  completing  his  tragedy  of  John  Woodvil,  which  se«^nis 
to  have  been  finished  about  Christmas,  and  transmitted  to  Mr. 
Kemblc.  Like  all  young  authors,  who  are  fascinated  by  the 
splendour  of  theatrical  representations,  he  lonijed  to  see  his 
conceptions  imbodied  on  the  stage,  and  to  receive  his  imme- 
diate reward  in  ihe  sympathy  oi"  a  crowd  of  excited  specta- 
tors.    The  hope  was  vain ;   but   it  cheered  him  in  many  a 


68  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

lonely  hour,  and  inspired  him  to  write  when  exhausted  with 
the  business  of  the  day,  and  when  the  less  powerful  stimulus 
of  the  press  would  have  been  insufficient  to  rouse  him.  In 
the  mean  time  he  continued  to  correspond  with  Mr.  Souihey, 
to  send  him  portions  of  his  play,  and  to  reciprocate  criticisms 
with  him.  The  following  three  letters,  addressed  to  Mr. 
Southey  in  the  spring  of  this  year,  require  no  commentary. 

TO    MR.  SOUTHEY. 

iif  *  *  *  *  * 

"I  am  to  blame  for  not  writing  to  you  before  on  my  own  ac- 
count ;  but  I  know  you  can  dispense  with  the  expressions  of 
gratitude,  or  I  should  have  thanked  you  before  for  all  May's 
kindness.*  He  has  liberally  supplied  the  person  I  spoke  to 
you  of  with  money,  and  had  procured  him  a  situation  just  after 
himself  had  lighted  upon  a  similar  one,  and  engaged  too  far  to 
recede.  But  May's  kindness  was  the  same,  and  my  thanks  to 
you  and  him  are  the  same.  May  went  about  on  this  business 
as  if  it  had  been  his  own.  But  you  knew  John  May  before 
this,  so  I  will  be  silent. 

"  I  shall  be  very  glad  to  hear  from  you,  when  convenient. 
I  do  not  know  how  your  Calendar  and  other  affairs  thrive ; 
but,  above  all,  I  have  not  heard  a  great  while  of  your  Madoc 
— the  opus  magnum.  I  would  willingly  send  you  something 
to  give  a  value  to  this  letter ;  but  I  have  only  one  slight  pas- 
sage to  send  you,  scarce  worth  the  sending,  which  I  want  to 
edge  in  somewhere  into  my  play,  which,  by-the-way,  hath  not 
received  the  addition  of  ten  lines,  besides,  since  I  saw  you. 
A  father,  old  Walter  Woodvil  (the  witch's  protege),  relates 
this  of  his  son  John,  who  '  fought  in  adverse  armies,'  being  a 
royalist,  and  his  father  a  parliamentary  man. 

"  I  saw  him  in  the  day  of  Worcester  fight, 
Whither  he  came  at  twice  seven  years, 
Under  the  discipHne  of  the  Lord  Falkland 
(His  uncle  by  the  mother's  side, 
Who  gave  his  youthful  politics  a  bent 
Quite /rom  the  principles  of  his  father's  house) ; 
There  did  I  see  this  valiant  Lamb  of  Mars, 
This  sprig  of  honour,  this  unbearded  John, 
This  veteran  in  green  years,  this  sprout,  this  Woodvil 
(With  dreadless  ease  guiding  a  fire-hot  steed, 
Which  seemed  to  scorn  the  manage  of  a  boy), 
Prick  forth  with  such  a  mirth  into  the  field, 
To  mingle  rivalship  and  acts  of  war 
Even  with  the  sinewy  masters  of  the  art — 
You  would  have  thought  the  work  of  blood  had  been 
A  play-game  merely,  and  the  rabid  Mars 
Had  put  his  harmful  hostile  nature  off. 
To  instruct  raw  youth  in  images  of  war. 
And  practice  of  the  unedged  players'  foils. 

*  See  ante,  p.  56. 


LETTERS    TO   SOUTIIEY.  69 

The  rough  fanatic  and  blood-practised  soldiery, 
Seeing  such  hope  and  virtue  in  the  boy, 
Disclosed  their  ranks  to  let  him  pass  unhurt, 
Checking  their  swords'  uncivil  injuries, 
As  loath  to  mar  that  curious  workmanship 
Of  Valour's  beauty  portrayed  in  his  face.' 

"  Lloyd  objects  to  '  portrayed  in  his  face,'  do  you  ?  I  like 
the  line. 

"  I  shall  clap  this  in  somewhere.  I  think  there  is  a  spirit 
through  the  lines  ;  perhaps  the  seventh,  eighth,  and  ninth  owe 
their  origin  to  Shakspeare,  though  no  image  is  borrowed. 
He  says  in  Henry  the  Fourth — 

'This  infant  Hotspur, 
Mars  in  swathing  clothes.' 

But,  pray,  did  Lord  Falkland  die  before  Worcester  fight  ?     In 
that  case  I  must  make  bold  to  unclify  some  other  nobleman. 
"  Kind  love  and  respects  to  Edith. 

«  C.  Lamb." 


TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  I  am  hugely  pleased  with  your  '  Spider,'  '  your  old  free- 
mason,' as  you  call  him.  The  three  first  stanzas  are  deli- 
cious ;  they  seem  to  me  a  compound  of  Burns  and  old  Quarles, 
those  kind  of  homestrokes,  where  more  is  felt  than  strikes  the 
ear ;  a  terseness,  a  jocular  pathos,  which  makes  one  feel  in 
laughter.  The  measure,  too,  is  novel  and  pleasing.  I  could 
almost  wonder  Rob.  Burns,  in  his  lifetime,  never  stumbled 
upon  it.  The  fourth  stanza  is  less  striking,  as  being  less 
original.  The  fifth  falls  off.  It  has  no  felicity  of  phrase,  no 
oldfashioned  phrase  or  feeling. 

'  Young  hopes,  and  love's  delightful  dreams,' 

savour  neither  of  Burns  nor  Quarles  ;  they  seem  more  like 
shreds  of  many  a  modern  sentimental  sonnet.  The  last 
stanza  hath  nothing  striking  in  it  if  I  except  the  two  conclu- 
ding lines,  which  are  Burns  all  over.  I  wish,  if  you  con- 
cur with  me,  these  things  could  be  looked  to.  I  am  sure  this 
is  a  kind  of  writing  which  comes  tenfold  better  recommended 
to  the  heart,  comes  there  more  like  a  neighbour  or  familiar, 
than  thousands  of  Hamnels,  and  Zillahs,  and  IVLadeloiis.  I 
beg  you  will  send  me  the  '  Holly-tree,'  if  it  at  all  resemble 
this,  for  it  must  please  me.  I  have  never  seen  it.  I  love 
this  sort  of  poems,  that  open  a  new  intercourse  witii  the  most 
despised  of  the  animal  and  insect  race.  I  think  this  vein 
may  be  further  opened.  Peter  Pindar  hath  very  prettily  apos- 
trophized a  fly ;  Burns  hath  his  mouse  and  his  louse  ;  Cole- 


70  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

ridge  less  successfully  hath  made  overtures  of  intimacy  to  a 
jackass,  therein  only  following,  at  unresembling  distance, 
Sterne  and  greater  Cervantes.  Besides  these,  I  know  of  no 
other  examples  of  breaking  down  the  partition  between  us  and 
our  '  poor  earthborn  companions.'  It  is  sometimes  revolting 
to  be  put  in  a  track  of  feeling  by  other  people,  not  one's  own 
immediate  thoughts,  else  1  would  persuade  you,  if  I  could,  1 
am  in  earnest,  to  commence  a  series  of  these  animal  poems, 
which  might  have  a  tendency  to  rescue  some  poor  creatures 
from  the  antipathy  of  mankind.  Some  thoughts  come  across 
me  ;  for  instance — to  a  rat,  to  a  toad,  to  a  cockchafer,  to  a 
mole — people  bake  moles  alive  by  a  slow  oven-fire  to  cure 
consumption — rats  are,  indeed,  the  most  despised  and  con- 
temptible parts  of  God's  earth.  I  killed  a  rat  the  other  day  by 
punching  him  to  pieces,  and  feel  a  weight  of  blood  upon  me 
to  this  hour.  Toads,  you  know,  are  made  to  fly,  and  tumble 
down,  and  crush  all  to  pieces.  Cockchafers  are  old  sport ; 
then,  again,  to  a  worm,  with  an  apostrophe  to  anglers,  those 
patient  tyrants,  meek  inflictors  of  pangs  intolerable,  cool  dev- 
ils ;  to  an  owl ;  to  all  snakes,  with  an  apology  for  their  poi- 
son ;  to  a  cat  in  boots  or  bladders.  Your  own  fancy,  if  it 
takes  a  fancy  to  these  hints,  will  suggest  many  more.  A  se- 
ries of  such  poems,  suppose  them  accompanied  with  plates 
descriptive  of  animal  torments,  cooks  roasting  lobsters,  fish- 
mongers crimping  scates,  &:c.,  &;c.,  would  take  excessively. 
I  will  willingly  enter  into  a  partnership  in  the  plan  with  you; 
I  think  my  heart  and  soul  would  go  with  it  too — at  least,  give 
it  a  thought.  My  plan  is  but  this  minute  come  into  my  head  ; 
but  it  strikes  me  instantaneously  as  something  new,  good,  and 
useful,  full  of  pleasure,  and  full  of  moral.  If  old  Quarles  and 
Wither  could  live  again,  we  would  invite  them  into  our  firm. 
Burns  hath  done  his  part. 


TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

*'  Dear  Southey — I  have  received  your  little  volume,  for 
which  I  thank  you,  though  I  do  not  entirely  approve  of  this 
sort  of  intercourse,  where  the  presents  are  all  on  one  side.  I 
have  read  the  last  Eclogue  again  with  great  pleasure.  It 
hath  gained  considerably  by  abridgment,  and  now  I  think  it 
wants  nothing  but  enlargement.  You  will  call  this  one  of  ty- 
rant Procrustes'  criticisms,  to  cut  and  pull  so  to  his  own  stand- 
ard ;  but  the  old  lady  is  so  great  a  favourite  with  me,  I  want 
to  hear  more  of  her ;  and  of  '  Joanna'  you  have  given  us  still 
less.  But  the  picture  of  the  rustics  leaning  over  the  bridge, 
and  the  old  lady  travelling  abroad  on  summer  evening  to  see 


LETTERS    7  0    SOUTHEY.  71 

her  garden  watered,  are  images  so  new  and  true,  that  I  deci- 
dedly prefer  this  '  Ruined  Cottage'  to  any  poem  in  the  book.  In- 
deed, I  think  it  the  only  one  that  will  bear  comparison  with 
your  '  Hymn  to  the  Penates,'  in  a  former  volume. 

"  I  compare  dissimilar  things  as  one  would  a  rose  and  a 
star,  for  the  pleasure  they  give  us,  or  as  a  child  soon  learns 
to  choose  between  a  cake  and  a  rattle  ;  for  dissimilars  have 
mostly  some  points  of  comparison.  The  next  best  poem,  I 
think,  is  the  first  Eclogue  ;  'tis  very  complete,  and  abounding 
in  little  pictures  and  realities.  The  remainder  Eclogues, 
excepting  only  the  '  Funeral,'  I  do  not  greatly  admire.  I  miss 
one^  which  had  at  least  as  good  a  title  to  publication  as  the 
'  Witch'  or  the  '  Sailor's  Mother.'  You  called  it  the  '  Last  of 
the  Family.'  The  '  Old  Woman  of  Berkeley'  comes  next ;  in 
some  humours  I  would  give  it  the  preference  above  any.  But 
who  the  devil  is  Matthew  of  Westminster?  You  are  as  fa- 
miliar with  these  antiquated  monastics  as  Swedenborg,  or,  as 
his  followers  affect  to  call  him,  the  Baron,  with  his  invisibles. 
But  you  have  raised  a  very  comic  effect  out  of  the  true  narra- 
tive of  Mattliew  of  Westminster.  'Tis  surprising  with  how 
little  addition  you  have  been  able  to  convert,  with  so  little  al- 
teration, his  incidents,  meant  for  terror,  into  circumstances 
and  food  for  spleen.  The  Parody  is  not  so  successful ;  it  has 
one  famous  line,  indeed,  which  conveys  the  finest  deathbed 
scene  I  ever  met  with. 

'  The  doctor  whisper'd  the  nurse,  and  the  surgeon  knew  what  he  said.' 

But  the  offering  the  bride  three  times  bears  not  the  slightest 
analogy  or  proportion  to  the  fiendish  noises  three  times  heard  ! 
In  '  Jaspar,'  the  circumstance  of  the  great  light  is  very  affect- 
ing. But  I  had  heard  you  mention  it  before.  The  '  Rose'  is  the 
only  insipid  piece  in  the  volume ;  it  hath  neither  thorns  nor 
sweetness  ;  and,  besides,  sets  all  chronology  and  probability 
at  defiance. 

" '  Cousin  Margaret,'  you  know,  I  like.  The  allusions  to 
the  Pilgrim's  Progress  are  particularly  happy,  and  harmonize 
tacitly  and  delicately  with  old  cousins  and  aunts.  To  familiar 
faces  we  do  associate  familiar  scenes  and  accustomed  ob- 
jects ;  but  what  hath  Apollidon  and  his  sea-nymphs  to  do  in 
these  affairs  1  Apollyon  I  could  have  borne,  though  he  stands 
for  the  devil,  but  who  is  Apollidon?  I  think  you  arc  too  apt 
to  conclude  faintly  with  some  cold  moral,  as  in  the  end  of  the 
poem  called  '  The  Victory' — 

•  Be  thou  her  comforter,  who  art  the  widow's  friend  ;' 

a  single  commonplace  line  of  comfort,  which  bears  no  pro- 
portion in  weight  or  number  to  the  many  linos  which  describe 


72  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY. 

suffering.  This  is  to  convert  religion  into  mediocre  feelings, 
which  should  burn,  and  glow,  and  tremble.  A  moral  should 
be  wrought  into  the  body  and  soul,  the  matter  and  tendency 
of  a  poem,  not  tagged  to  the  end,  like  a  '  God  send  the  good 
ship  into  harbour'  at  the  conclusion  of  our  bills  of  lading. 
The  finishing  of  the  '  Sailor'  is  also  imperfect.  Any  dissent- 
ing minister  may  say  and  do  as  much. 

•'  These  remarks,  I  know,  are  crude  and  unwrought,  but  I 
do  not  lay  claim  to  much  accurate  thinking.  I  never  judge 
system-wise  of  things,  but  fasten  often  upon  particulars.  After 
all,  there  is  a  great  deal  in  the  book  that  I  must,  for  time, 
leave  unmentioned,  to  deserve  my  thanks  for  its  own  sake,  as 
well  as  for  the  friendly  remembrances  implied  in  the  gift.  I 
again  return  you  my  thanks. 

*'  Pray  present  my  love  to  Edith. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

In  the  summer  Lamb  revisited  the  scenes  in  Hertfordshire, 
where,  in  his  grandmother's  time,  he  had  spent  so  many  hap- 
py holydays.  In  the  following  letter  he  just  hints  at  feelings 
which,  many  years  after,  he  so  beautifully  developed  in  those 
essays  of  "  Elia" — "Blakesmoor  House"  and  '*  MackeryEnd." 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  Dear  Southey — I  have  but  just  got  your  letter,  being  re- 
turned from  Herts.,  where  I  have  passed  a  few  red-letter  days 
with  much  pleasure.  I  would  describe  the  country  to  you, 
as  you  have  done  by  Devonshire,  but,  alas  !  I  am  a  poor  pen 
at  that  same.  I  could  tell  you  of  an  old  house  with  a  tapes- 
try bedroom,  the  judgment  of  Solomon  composing  one  panel, 
and  Actaeon  spying  Diana  naked  the  other.  I  could  tell  of 
an  old  marble  hall  with  Hogarth's  prints,  and  the  Roman 
Caesars  in  marble  hung  round.  I  could  tell  of  a  wilderness, 
and  of  a  village  church,  and  where  the  bones  of  my  honoured 
grandam  lie ;  but  there  are  feelings  which  refuse  to  be  trans- 
lated, sulky  aborigines,  which  will  not  be  naturalized  in  anoth- 
er soil.  Of  this  nature  are  old  family  faces  and  scenes  of 
infancy. 

*'  I  have  given  your  address  and  the  books  you  want  to 

the  A 's ;  they  will   send  them   as  soon  as  they  can  get 

them,  but  they  do  not  seem  quite  familiar  to  their  names.  I 
shall  have  nothing  to  communicate,  I  fear,  to  the  Anthology. 
You  shall  have  some  fragments  of  my  play,  if  you  desire  them, 
but  I  think  I  had  rather  print  it  whole.  Have  you  seen  it  ? 
or  shall  I  lend  you  a  copy  ?     I  want  your  opinion  of  it. 

"  I  must  get  to  business,  so  farewell ;  my  kind  remeni- 
brances  to  Edith." 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  73 

In  the  autumn  of  this  year  Lamb's  choice  list  of  friends  re- 
ceived a  most  important  addition  in  Mr.  Thomas  Manning,  then 
a  mathematical  tutor  at  Cambridge  ;  of  whom  he  became  a  fre- 
quent correspondent,  and  to  whom  he  remained  strongly  at- 
tached through  life.  Lloyd  had  become  a  graduate  of  the 
university,  and  to  his  introduction  Lamb  was  indebted  for 
Manning's  friendship.  The  following  letters  will  show  how 
earnestly,  yet  how  modestly,  Lamb  sought  it. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Dear  Manning — The  particular  kindness,  even  up  to  a 
degree  of  attachment,  which  I  have  experienced  from  you, 
seems  to  claim  some  distinct  acknowledgment  on  my  part. 
1  could  not  content  myself  with  a  bare  remembrance  to  you, 
conveyed  in  some  letter  to  Lloyd. 

"  Will  it  be  agreeable  to  you  if  I  occasionally  recruit  your 
memory  of  me,  which  else  must  soon  fade,  if  you  consider  the 
brief  intercourse  we  have  had  ?  I  am  not  likely  to  prove  a 
troublesome  correspondent.  My  scribbling  days  are  past.  I 
shall  have  no  sentiments  to  communicate  but  as  they  spring  up 
from  some  living  and  worthy  occasion. 

"  I  look  forward  with  great  pleasure  to  the  performance  o. 
your  promise,  that  we  should  meet  in  London  early  in  the  en- 
suing year.  The  century  must  needs  commence  auspicious- 
ly for  me,  that  brings  with  it  Manning's  friendship  as  an  ear- 
nest of  it3  after  gifts. 

*'  I  should  have  written  before  but  for  a  troublesome  inflam- 
mation in  one  of  my  eyes,  brought  on  by  night  travelling  with 
the  coach  windows  sometimes  up. 

"  What  more  I  have  to  say  shall  be  reserved  for  a  letter  to 
Lloyd.  I  must  not  prove  tedious  to  you  in  my  first  outside, 
lest  I  should  aff'right  you  by  my  ill-judged  loquacity, 

I  am, 
**  Yours  most  sincerely, 

*'  C.  Lamb." 

TO    MK.    MANNING. 

"  Dear  Manning — Having  suspended  my  correspondence  a 
decent  interval,  as  knowing  that  even  good  things  may  be 
taken  to  satiety,  a  wish  cannot  but  recur  to  learn  whether 
you  be  still  well  and  happy.  Do  all  things  continue  in  the 
state  I  left  them  in  Cambridge  ? 

"  Do  your  night  parties  still  flourish  ?  and  do  you  continue 
to  bewilder  your  company,  with  your  thousand  faces,  running 
down  through  all  the  keys  of  idiotism  (like  Lloyd  over  his  per- 
perlual  harpsichord),  from  the  smile  and  the  glimmer  of  half- 

VoL.  I.— 7  D 


74  LETTERS    TO   MANNING. 

sense  and  quarter-sense,  to  the  grin  and  hanging  lip  of  Betty 
Foy's  own  Johnny  1  And  does  the  face-dissolving  curfew 
sound  at  twelve  ?  How  unlike  the  great  originals  were  your 
petty  terrors  in  the  postscript,  not  fearful  enough  to  make  a 
fairy  shudder,  or  a  Lilliputian  fine  lady,  eight  months  full  of 
child,  miscarry.  Yet  one  of  them,  which  had  more  beast 
than  the  rest,  I  thought  faintly  resembled  one  of  your  brutifi- 
cations.  But,  seriously,  I  long  to  see  your  own  honest  Man- 
ning-face again.  I  did  not  mean  a  pun;  your  mans  face, you 
will  be  apt  to  say,  I  know  your  wicked  w^ill  to  pun.  I  cannot 
now  write  to  Lloyd  and  you  too,  so  you  must  convey  as  much 
interesting  intelligence  as  this  may  contain,  or  be  thought  to 
contain,  to  him  and  Sophia,  with  my  dearest  love  and  remem- 
brances. 

"  By-the-by,  I  think  you  and  Sophia  both  incorrect  with  re- 
gard to  the  title  of  the  play.*  Allowing  your  objection  (which 
is  not  necessary,  as  pride  may  be,  and  is,  in  real  life,  often  cured 
by  misfortunes  not  directly  originating  from  its  own  acts,  as 
Jeremy  Taylor  will  tell  you,  a  naughty  desire  is  sometimes 
sent  to  cure  it.  I  know  you  read  these  practical  divines),  but 
allowing  your  objection,  does  not  the  betraying  of  his  father's 
secret  directly  spring  from  pride  ?  from  the  pride  of  wine  and 
a  full  heart,  and  a  proud  overstepping  of  the  ordinary  rules 
of  morality,  and  contempt  of  the  prejudices  of  mankind,  which 
are  not  to  bind  superior  souls — '  as  trust  in  the  matter  of  se- 
crets all  ties  of  blood,  <fec.,  <fec.,  keeping  o(  promises,  the  feeble 
mind's  religion,  binding  our  morning  knowledge  to  the  perform- 
ance of  what  last  night's  ignorance  spake' — does  he  not  prate 
that  '  Great  Spirits'  must  do  more  than  die  for  their  friend  ? 
does  not  the  pride  of  wine  incite  him  to  display  some  evi- 
dence of  friendship,  which  its  own  irregularity  shall  make 
great  ?  This  I  know,  that  I  meant  his  punishment  not  alone 
to  be  a  cure  for  his  daily  and  habitual  pride,  but  the  direct 
consequence  and  appropriate  punishment  of  a  particular  act  of 
pride. 

"  If  you  do  not  understand  it  so,  it  is  my  fault  in  not  ex- 
plaining my  meaning. 

"  I  have  not  seen  Coleridge  since,  and  scarcely  expect  to 
see  him  ;  perhaps  he  has  been  at  Cambridge, 

"  Need  I  turn  over,  to  blot  a  fresh,  clean  half-sheet  ?  merely 
to  say,  what  I  hope  you  are  sure  of  without  my  repeating  it, 
that  I  would  have  you  consider  me,  dear  Manning, 

"  Your  sincere  friend, 

"C.  Lamb." 

*  It  had  been  proposed  to  entitle  John  Woodvil  "  Pride's  Cure." 


LETTERS    TO   COLERIDGE.  75 

Early  in  the  following  year  (1800),  Lamb,  with  his  sister, 
removed  to  Chapel-street,  Pentonville.  In  the  summer  he 
visited  Coleridge  at  Stovvey,  and  spent  a  few  delightful  holy- 
days  in  his  society  and  that  of  Wordsworth,  who  then  resided 
in  the  neighbourhood.  This  was  the  first  opportunity  Lamb 
had  enjoyed  of  seeing  much  of  the  poet  who  was  destined  to 
exercise  a  beneficial  and  lasting  influence  on  the  literature 
and  moral  sense  of  the  opening  century.  At  this  time  Lamb 
was  scarcely  prepared  to  sympathize  with  the  naked  simpli- 
city of  the  "Lyrical  Ballads"  which  Wordsworth  was  pre- 
paring for  the  press.  The  "  rich  conceits"  of  the  writers  of 
Elizabeth's  reign  had  been  blended  with  his  first  love  of  poe- 
try, and  he  could  not  at  once  acknowledge  the  serene  beauty 
of  a  style  in  which  language  was  only  the  stainless  mirror  of 
thought,  and  which  sought  no  aid  either  from  the  grandeur  of 
artificial  life  or  the  pomp  of  words.  In  after  days  he  was 
among  the  most  earnest  of  this  great  poet's  admirers,  and  re- 
joiced as  he  found  the  scoffers  who  sneered  at  his  bold  exper- 
iment gradually  owning  his  power.  How  he  felt  when  the 
little  golden  opportunity  of  conversation  with  Wordsworth  and 
Coleridge  had  passed  will  appear  from  the  following  letter, 
which  seems  to  have  been  addressed  to  Coleridge  shortly  after 
his  return  to  London. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  I  am  scarcely  yet  so  reconciled  to  the  loss  of  you,  or  so 
subsided  into  my  wonted  uniformity  of  feeling,  as  to  sit  calmly 
down  to  think  of  you  and  write  to  you.  But  I  reason  myself 
into  the  belief  that  those  few  and  pleasant  holydays  shall  not 
have  been  spent  in  vain.  I  feel  improvement  in  the  recollec- 
tion of  many  a  casual  conversation.  The  names  of  Tom  Poole, 
of  Wordsworth  and  his  good  sister,  with  thine  and  Sarah's, 
are  become  '  familiar  in  my  mouth  as  household  words.'  You 
would  make  me  very  happy,  if  you  think  W.  has  no  objec- 
tion, by  transcribing  for  me  that  inscription  of  his.  I  have 
some  scattered  sentences  ever  floating  on  my  memory,  teazing 
me  ihat  I  cannot  remember  more  of  it.  You  may  believe  I 
will  make  no  improper  use  of  it.  Believe  me,  I  can  think 
now  of  many  subjects  on  which  I  had  planned  gaining  infor- 
mation from  you;  but  I  forgot  my  'treasure's  worth'  while  I 
possessed  it.  Your  leg  is  now  become  to  me  a  matter  of  much 
more  importance  ;  and  many  a  little  thing,  which,  when  I  was 
present  with  you,  seemed  scarce  to  indent  my  notice,  now 
presses  painfully  on  my  remembrance.  Is  the  Patriot  come 
yet?  Are  Wordsworth  and  his  sister  gone  yet?  I  was  looking 
ou    for  John  'I'holwall  all  the  way  from  Bridgewater,  and,  had 

D  2 


76  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

I  met  him,  I  think  it  would  have  moved  me  to  tears.  You  will 
oblige  me,  too,  by  sending  me  my  greatcoat,  which  I  left  behind 
in  the  oblivious  state  the  mind  is  thrown  into  at  parting  ;  is  it 
not  ridiculous  that  1  sometimes  envy  that  greatcoat  lingering 
so  cunningly  behind  ;  at  present  I  have  none,  so  send  it  me  by 
a  Stowey  wagon,  if  there  be  such  a  thing,  directing  for  C.  L., 
No.  45  Chapel-street,  Pentonville,  near  London.  But,  above 
all,  that  inscription  !  it  will  recall  to  me  the  tones  of  all  your 
voices,  and  with  them  many  a  remembered  kindness  to  one 
who  could  and  can  repay  you  all  only  by  the  silence  of  a 
grateful  heart.  I  could  not  talk  much  while  I  was  with  you, 
but  my  silence  was  not  sullenness,  nor,  I  hope,  from  any  bad 
motive  ;  but,  in  truth,  disuse  has  made  me  awkward  at,  it.  I 
know  I  behaved  myself,  particularly  at  Tom  Poole's  and  at 
Cruikshank's,  most  like  a  sulky  child  ;  but  company  and  con- 
verse are  strange  to  me.  It  was  kind  in  you  all  to  endure  me 
as  you  did. 

"  A.re  you  and  your  dear  Sarah — to  me  also  very  dear,  be- 
cause very  kind — agreed  yet  about  the  management  of  little 
Hartley,  and  how  go  on  the  little  rogue's  teeth  ?  I  will  see 
White  to-morrow,  and  he  shall  send  you  information  on  that 
matter ;  but,  as  perhaps  1  can  do  it  as  well  after  talking  with 
him,  I  will  keep  this  letter  open. 

"  My  love  and  thanks  to  you,  and  all  of  you. 

"C.  L. 

"  Wednesday  evening." 

Coleridge  shortly  after  came  to  town,  to  make  arrangements 
for  his  contributions  to  the  daily  press.  The  following  note 
is  addressed  to  him  when  in  London. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Dear  Coleridge — Now  I  write,  I  cannot  miss  this  opportu- 
nity of  acknowledging  the  obligations  myself,  and  the  readers 
in  general  of  that  luminous  paper,  the  '  Morning  Post,'  are 
under  to  you  for  the  very  novel  and  exquisite  manner  in  which 
you  combined  political  with  grammatical  science  in  your  yes- 
terday's dissertation  on  Mr.  Wyndham's  unhappy  composition. 
It  must  have  been  the  death-blow  to  that  ministry.  I  expect 
Pitt  and  Grenville  to  resign.  More  especially  the  delicate 
and  Cottrellian  grace  with  which  you  officiated,  with  a  ferula 
for  a  white  wand,  as  gentleman  usher  to  the  word  *  also,'  which, 
it  seems,  did  not  know  its  place. 

'*  I  expect  Manning  of  Cambridge  in  town  to-night ;  will 
you  fulfil  your  promise  of  meeting  him  at  my  house  1  He  is  a 
man  of  a  thousand.     Give  me  a  line  to  say  what  day,  whether 


LETTERS   TO    MANNING.  77 

Saturday,  Sunday,  Monday,  &;c.,  and  if  Sarah  and  the  Philos- 
opher can  come.  I  am  afraid,  if  I  did  not  at  intervals  call 
upon  you,  I  should  never  see  you.  But  I  forget  the  affairs  of 
the  nation  engross  your  time  and  your  mind. 

"  Farewell, 

"  C.  L." 

Coleridge  afterward  spent  some  weeks  with  Lamb,  as  ap- 
pears from  the  following  letter  : — 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Dear  Manning — I  am  living  in  a  continuous  feast.  Cole- 
ridge has  been  with  me  now  for  nigh  three  weeks,  and  the 
more  I  see  of  him  in  the  quotidian  undress  and  relaxation  of 
his  mind,  the  more  cause  I  see  to  love  him,  and  believe  him  a 
very  good  man,  and  all  those  foolish  impressions  to  the  con- 
trary fly  off  like  morning  slumbers.  He  is  engaged  in  trans- 
lations, which,  I  hope,  will  keep  him  this  month  to  come.  He 
is  uncommonly  kind  and  friendly  to  me.  He  ferrets  me  day 
and  night  to  do  something.  He  tends  me,  amid  all  \\\^  own 
worrying  and  heart-oppressing  occupations,  as  a  gardener 
tends  his  young  iM/^p.  Marry  come  up  !  what  a  pretty  simili- 
tude, and  how  like  your  humble  servant !  He  has  lugged  me 
to  the  brink  of  engaging  to  a  newspaper,  and  has  suggested  to 
me,  for  a  first  plan,  the  forgery  of  a  supposed  manuscript  of 
Burton,  the  anatomist  of  melancholy.  I  have  even  written  the 
introductory  letter  ;  and,  if  I  can  pick  up  a  few  guineas  this 
way,  I  feel  they  will  be  most  refreshing,  bread  being  so  dear. 
If  I  go  on  with  it,  I  will  apprize  you  of  it,  as  you  may  like  to 
see  my  things !  and  the  tulip,  of  all  flowers,  loves  to  be  ad- 
mired most. 

"  Pray  pardon  me,  if  my  letters  do  not  come  very  thick.  I 
am  so  taken  up  with  one  thing  or  other  that  I  cannot  pick  out 
(I  will  not  say  time,  but)  fitting  times  to  write  to  you.  My 
dear  love  to  Lloyd  and  Sophia,  and  pray  split  this  thin  letter 
into  three  parts,  and  present  them  with  the  two  biggest  in  my 
name. 

"  They  are  my  oldest  friends  ;  but,  ever  the  new  friend 
driveth  out  the  old,  as  \\\v.  ballad  sings  !  God  bless  you  all' 
three  !     I  would  hear  from  LI.  if  I  could. 

"  C.  L. 

"  Flour  has  just  fallen  nine  shillings  a  sack !  we  shall  be  all 
too  rich. 

"Tell  Charles  I  have  seen  his  mamma,  and  have  almost 
fallen  in  love  with  her,  sinc(;  I  mayn't  with  Olivia.      She  is  so 
fine  and  graceful,  a  complete  matron-lady-Quaker.     She  has 
7* 


78  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

given  me  two  little  books.  Olivia  grows  a  charming  girl — full 
of  feeling,  and  thinner  than  she  was  ;  but  I  have  not  time  to 
fall  in  love. 

"  Mary  presents  her  general  compliments.  She  keeps  in  fine 
health !" 

Coleridge,  during  this  visit,  recommended  Lamb  to  Mr. 
Daniel  Stuart,  then  editor  of  the  "  Morning  Post,"  as  a  writer 
of  light  articles,  by  which  he  might  add  something  to  an  in- 
come then  barely  sufficient  for  the  decent  support  of  himself 
and  his  sister.  It  would  seem,  from  his  next  letter  to  Man- 
ning, that  he  had  made  an  offer  to  try  his  hand  at  some  per- 
sonal squibs,  which,  ultimately,  was  not  accepted.  Manning 
need  not  have  feared  that  there  would  have  been  a  particle  of 
malice  in  them  !  liamb  afterward  became  a  correspondent  to 
the  paper,  and  has  recorded  his  experience  of  the  misery  of 
toiling  after  pleasantries  in  one  of  the  "  Essays  of  Elia,"  en- 
tilled,  "  Newspapers  thirty-five  years  ago." 

•  TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  C.  L.'s  moral  sense  presents  her  compliments  to  Doctor 
Manning,  is  very  thankful  for  his  medical  advice,  but  is  happy 
to  add  that  her  disorder  has  died  of  itself 

"  Dr.  Manning,  Coleridge  has  left  us  to  go  into  the  north, 
on  a  visit  to  his  god,  Wordsworth.  With  him  have  flown  all 
my  splendid  prospects  of  engagement  with  the  *  Morning 
Post,'  all  my  visionary  guineas,  the  deceitful  wages  of  unborn 
scandal.  In  truth,  I  wonder  you  took  it  up  so  seriously.  All 
my  intention  was  but  to  make  a  little  sport  with  such  public 

and  fair  game  as   Mr.  Pitt,  Mr  Wilberforce,  Mrs.  F ,  the 

devil,  &.C. — gentry  dipped  in  Styx  all  over,  whom  no  paper 
javelin-lings  can  touch.  To  have  made  free  with  these  cattle, 
where  was  the  harm?  'twould  have  been  but  giving  a  polish 
to  lampblack,  not  nigrifying  a  negro  primarily.  After  all,  I 
cannot  but  regret  my  involuntary  virtue.  Hang  virtue  that's 
thrust  upon  us  ;  it  behaves  itself  with  such  constraint,  till  con- 
science opens  the  window  and  lets  out  the  goose.  I  had 
struck  off*  two  imitations  of  Burton,  quite  abstracted  from  any 
modern  allusions,  which  it  was  my  intent  only  to  engage  in 
from  lime  to  time  to  make  'em  popular. 

"  Stuart  has  got  these,  with  an  introductory  letter  ;  but,  not 
hearing  from  him,  I  have  ceased  from  my  labours,  but  I  write 
to  him  to-day  to  get  a  final  answer.  1  am  afraid  they  won't 
do  for  a  paper.  Burton  is  a  scarce  gentleman,  not  much  known, 
else  I  had  done  'em  pretty  well. 

*'  I  have  also  hit  off"  a  few  lines  in  the  name  of  Burton,  being 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  79 

a  *  Conceit  of  Diabolic  Possession.'  Burton  was  a  man  often 
assailed  by  deepest  melancholy,  and  at  other  times  much  given 
to  laughing  and  jesting,  as  is  the  way  with  melancholy  men. 
I  will  send  them  you  :  they  were  almost  extempore,  and  no 
great  things  ;  but  you  will  indulge  them.  Robert  Lloyd  is 
come  to  town.  Priscilla  meditates  going  to  see  Pizarro  at 
Drury  Lane  to-night  (from  her  uncle's),  under  cover  of  coming 
to  dine  with  me  .  .  heu  I  tempora  !  heu  !  mores  !  1  have  barely 
lime  to  finish,  as  I  expect  her  and  Robin  every  minute. 

"  Yours  as  usual, 

*'  C.  L." 

The  following  is  an  extract  from  a  letter  addressed  about 
this  time  to  Manning,  who  had  taken  a  view  of  a  personal 
matter  relating  to  a  common  friend  of  both  directly  contrary 
to  that  of  Lamb. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  Rest  you  merry  in  your  opinion  !  Opinion  is  a  species 
of  property;  and  though  I  am  always  desirous  to  share  with 
my  friend  to  a  certain  extent,  I  shall  ever  like  to  keep  some 
tenets  and  some  property  properly  my  own.  Some  day, 
Manning,  when  we  meet,  substituting  Croydon  and  fair  Ama- 
ryllis for and ,  we  will  discuss  together  this  ques- 
tion of  moral  feeling,  '  In  what  cases,  and  how  far  sincerity  is 
a  virtue  V  I  do  not  mean  Truth,  a  good  Olivia-like  creature, 
God  bless  her,  who,  meaning  no  offence,  is  always  ready  to 
give  an  answer  when  she  is  asked  why  she  did  so  and  so  ;  but 
a  certain  forward-talking  half-brother  of  hers.  Sincerity,  that 
amphibious  gentleman,  who  is  so  ready  to  perk  up  his  ob- 
noxious sentiments  unasked  into  your  notice,  as  Midas  would 
do  his  ears  into  your  face  uncalled  for.  But  I  despair  of  doing 
anything  by  a  letter  in  tlie  way  of  explaining  or  coming  to  ex- 
planations. A  good  wish,  or  a  pun,  or  a  piece  of  secret  his- 
tory, may  be  well  enough  that  way  conveyed  ;  nay,  it  has  been 
known  that  intelligence  of  a  turkey  halli  been  conveyed  by  that 
medium  without  much  ambiguity.  Godwin  I  am  a  good  deal 
pleased  with.  He  is  a  very  well-behaved,  pleasant  man;  nothing 
very  brilliant  about  his  conversation,  or  imposing,  as  you  may 
suppose  ;  quite  another  guess  sort  of  gentleman  from  what 
your  Anti-Jacobin  Christians  imagine  him.  I  was  well  pleased 
to  find  he  has  neither  horns  nor  claws  ;  quite  a  tame  creature, 
1  assure  you.  A  middle-sized  man  in  stature  ;  whereas,  from 
his  noisy  fame,  you  would  expect  to  find  a  Briareus  Centi- 
manus,  or  a  Tityus  tall  enough  to  pull  Jupiter  from  his  heavens. 

"  Pray,  is  it  a  part  of  your  sincerity  to  show  my  letters  to 


80  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

Lloyd  ?  for,  really,  gentlemen  ought  to  explain  their  virtues 
upon  a  first  acquaintance,  to  prevent  mistakes. 

"  God  bless  you,  Manning.  Take  my  trifling  as  trifling ; 
and  believe  me,  seriously  and  deeply, 

"  Your  well-wisher  and  friend, 

"C.  L." 

The  following  letter  was  addressed  to  Coleridge  shortly 
after  he  had  left  London  on  a  visit  to  Wordsworth,  who,  in  the 
mean  time,  had  settled  on  the  borders  of  Grasmere. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Dear  Coleridge — I  have  taken  to-day,  and  delivered  to 
L.  &L  Co.,  imprimis,  your  books,  viz.,  three  ponderous  German 
dictionaries,  one  volume  (I  can  find  no  more)  of  German  and 
French  ditto,  sundry  other  German  books  unbound,  as  you  left 
them, '  Percy's  Ancient  Poetry,'  and  one  volume  of '  Ander- 
son's Poets.'  I  specify  them,  that  you  may  not  lose  any.  Se- 
cundo,  a  dressing-gown  (value  fivepence)  in  which  you  used  to 
sit  and  look  like  a  conjurer  when  you  were  translating  Wal 
lenstein.  A  case  of  two  razors,  and  a  shaving-box  and  strap. 
This  it  has  cost  me  a  severe  struggle  to  part  with.  They  are 
in  a  brown-paper  parcel,  which  also  contains  sundry  papersj 
and  poems,  sermons,  some  few  Epic  Poems — one  about  Cain 
and  Abel,  which  came  from  Poole,  &:c.,  &c.,  and  also  your 
tragedy,  with  one  or  two  small  German  books,  and  that  drama 
in  which  Got-fader  performs  Tertio  ;  a  small  oblong  box  con- 
taining all  your  letters^  collected  from  all  your  waste  papers, 
and  which  fill  the  said  little  box.  All  other  waste  papers, 
which  I  judged  worth  sending,  are  in  the  paper-parcel  afore- 
said. But  you  will  find  all  your  letters  in  the  box  by  them- 
selves. Thus  have  I  discharged  my  conscience  and  my  lum. 
ber-room  of  all  your  property,  save  and  except  a  folio  entitled 
*  Tyrrell's  Bibliotheca  Politica,'  which  you  used  to  learn 
your  politics  out  of  when  you  wrote  for  the  *  Post,'  ?nutatis 
mutandis,  i.  e.,  applying  past  inferences  to  modern  data.  I 
retain  that,  because  I  am  sensible  I  am  very  deficient  in  the 
politics  myself;  and  I  have  torn  up — don't  be  angry,  waste  pa- 
per has  risen  forty  per  cent.,  and  I  can't  afibrd  to  buy  it — all 
'  Bonaparte's  Letters,'  '  Arthur  Young's  Treatise  on  Corn,'  and 
one  or  two  more  light-armed  infantry,  which  I  thought  better 
suited  the  flippancy  of  London  discussion  than  the  dignity  of 
Keswick  thinking.  Mary  says  you  will  be  in  a  passion  about 
them  when  you  come  to  miss  them  ;  but  you  must  study  phi- 
losophy. Read  '  Albertus  Magnus  de  Chartis  Amissis'  five 
times -over  after  phlebotomizing — 'tis   Burton's   recipe — and 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  81 

then  be  angry  with  an  absent  friend  if  you  can.  Sara  is  ob- 
scure. Am  I  to  understand  by  her  letter  that  she  sends  a  kiss 
to  Eliza  B ?  Pray  tell  your  wife  that  a  note  of  interroga- 
tion on  the  superscription  of  a  letter  is  highly  ungrammatical 
— she  proposes  writing  my  name  Lamb  ?  Lambc  is  quite 
enough.  I  have  had  the  Anthology,  and  like  only  one  thing  in 
it,  Lewti;  but  of  that  the  last  stanza  is  detestable,  the  rest  most 
exquisite  !  the  epithet  enviable  would  dash  the  finest  poem. 
For  God's  sake  (I  never  was  more  serious),  don't  make  me 
ridiculous  any  more  by  terming  me  gentle-hearted  in  print,  or 
do  it  in  better  verses.  It  did  well  enough  five  years  ago 
when  I  came  to  see  you,  and  was  moral  coxcomb  enough  at 
the  time  you  wrote  the  lines  to  feed  upon  such  epithets  ;  but, 
besides  that,  the  meaning  of  gentle  is  equivocal  at  best,  and 
almost  always  means  poor-spirited  ;  the  very  quality  of  gen- 
tleness is  abhorrent  to  such  vile  trumpetings.  My  sentiment 
is  long  since  vanished.  I  hope  my  virtues  have  done  sucking. 
I  can  scarce  think  but  you  meant  it  in  joke.  I  hope  you  did, 
for  I  should  be  ashamed  to  think  you  could  think  to  gratify  me 
by  such  praise,  fit  only  to  be  a  cordial  to  some  green-sick  son- 
neteer.* 

"  I  have  hit  off  the  following  in  imitation  of  old  English  po- 
etry, which,  I  imagine,  I  am  a  dab  at.  The  measure  is  un- 
measurable  ;  but  it  most  resembles  that  beautiful  ballad  the 
Old  and  Young  Courtier  ;  and  in  its  features  of  taking  the  ex- 
tremes of  two  situations  for  just  parallel,  it  resembles  the  old 
poetry  certainly.  If  I  could  but  stretch  out  the  circumstances 
to  twelve  more  verses,  i.  e.,  if  I  had  as  much  genius  as  the 
writer  of  that  old  song,  I  think  it  would  be  excellent.  It  was 
to  follow  an  imitation  of  Burton  in  prose,  which  you  have  not 
seen.     But  fate  '  and  wisest  Stewart'  say  No.f 

"  I  can  send  you  two  hundred  pens  and  six  quires  of  paper 
immediately,  if  they  will  answer  the  carriage  by  coach.  It 
would  be  foolish  to  pack  'em  up  cum  7nultis  libris  et  cceteris — 
they  would  all  spoil.  I  only  wait  your  commands  to  coach 
them.  I  would  pay  five-and-forty  thousand  carriages  to  read 
W.'s  tragedy,  of  which  I  have  heard  so  much  and  seen  so  lit- 

♦  This  refers  to  a  poem  of  Coleridge's,  composed  in  1797,  and  published  in 
the  Anthology  of  the  year  1800,  under  the  title  of"  This  Lime  tree  Bower  my 
Prison,''  addressed  to  "  Charles  Ljinib,  of  the  India  House,  London,"  m  which 
Lamb  is  thus  apostrophized,  as  taking  more  fileasure  in  the  country  than  Cole- 
ridge's other  visiters— a  compliment  which  even  then  he  scarcely  merited  • — 

"  But  thou,  methinks  most  glad, 
My  gentle-hearted  (-harles  !     For  thou  hast  pined 
And  linger'd  after  nature  many  a  year, 
In  the  great  city  pent." 
t  The  nuaint  and  pathetic  poem,  entitled  "  A  Ballad,  noticing  the  diflference 
of  rich  and  poor,  in  the  ways  of  a  rich  noble's  palace  and  a  poor  workhouse  " 

D  3 


82  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

tie — only  what  I  saw  at  Stowey.  Pray  give  me  an  order  in 
writing  on  Longman  for  '  Lyrical  Ballads.'  I  have  the  first 
volume,  and,  truth  to  tell,  six  shillings  is  a  broad  shot.  I  cram 
all  I  can  in  to  save  a  multiplying  of  letters — those  pretty  com- 
ets with  swinging  tails. 

"  I'll  just  crowd  in  God  bless  you  ! 

Wednesday  night,  6th  Aug.,  1800." 

"  John  Woodvil"  was  now  printed,  although  not  published 
till  a  year  afterward  ;  probably  withheld  in  the  hope  of  its 
representation  on  the  stage.  A  copy  was  sent  to  Coleridge 
for  Wordsworth,  with  the  following  letter,  or  cluster  of  letters, 
written  at  several  times.  The  ladies  referred  to  in  the  exquis- 
ite description  of  Coleridge's  blue-stocking  friends  are  beyond 
the  reach  of  feeling  its  application  ;  nor  will  it  be  detected  by 
the  most  apprehensive  of  their  surviving  friends. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

'*  I  send  you,  in  this  parcel,  my  play,  which  I  beg  you  to 
present,  in  my  name,  with  my  respect  and  love,  to  Wordsworth 
and  his  sister.     You  blame  us  for  giving  your  direction  to  Miss 

W ;  the  woman  has  been  ten  times  after  us  about  it,  and 

we  gave  it  her  at  last,  under  the  idea  that  no  further  harm 
would  ensue  ;  but  she  would  once  write  to  you,  and  you  would 
bite  your  lips,  and  forget  to  answer  it,  and  so  it  would  end. 
You  read  us  a  dismal  homily  upon  '  Realities.'  We  know, 
quite  as  well  as  you  do,  what  are  shadows  and  what  are  reali- 
ties. You,  for  instance,  when  you  are  over  your  fourth  or  fifth 
jorum,  chirping  about  old  school  occurrences,  are  the  best  of 
realities.     Shadows  are  cold,  thin  things,  that  have  no  warmth 

or  grasp  in   them.      Miss  W ,  and  her  friend,  and  a  tribe 

of  authoresses  that  come  after  you  here  daily,  and,  in  defect 
of  you,  hive  and  cluster  upon  us,  are  the  shadows.  You  en- 
couraged that  mopsey.  Miss  W ,  to  dance  after  you,  in 

the  hope  of  having  her  nonsense  put  into  a  nonsensical  An- 
thology. We  have  pretty  well  shaken  her  off  by  that  simple 
expedient  of  referring  her  to  you  ;  but  there  are  more  burs  in 
the  wind.  I  came  home  t'other  day  from  business,  hungry 
as  a  hunter,  to  dinner,  with  nothing,  I  am  sure,  of  the  author 
hut  hunger  about  me,  and  whom  found  I  closeted  with  Mary 

but  a  friend  of  this  Miss  W ,  one  Miss  B e,  or  B— y, 

I  don't  know  how  she  spells  her  name.  I  just  came  in  time 
enough,  I  believe,  luckily,  to  prevent  them  from  exchanging 
vows  of  eternal  friendship.  It  seems  she  is  one  of  your  au- 
thoresses, that  you  first  foster,  and  then  upbraid  us  with.  But 
1  forgive  you.     ♦  The  rogue  has  given  me  potions  to  make  me 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  83 

love  him.'  Well ;  go  she  would  not,  nor  step  a  step  over  our 
threshold,  till  we  had  promised  to  come  and  drink  tea  with  her 
next  night.  I  had  not  seen  her  before,  and  could  not  tell  who 
it  was  that  was  so  familiar.  We  went,  however,  not  to  be  im- 
polite.   Her  lodgings  are  up  two  flights  of  stairs  in street. 

Tea  and  coffee,  and  macaroons — a  kind  of  cake  which  I  much 
love.     We  sat  down.     Presently  Miss  B broke  the  si- 
lence by  declaring  herself  quite  of  a  different  opinion  from 
D^Israeli,  who  supposes  the  differences  of  human  intellect  to 
be  the  mere  eflfect  of  organization.      She  begged  to  know  my 
opinion.     I  attempted  to  carry  it  oflf  with  a  pun  upon  organ, 
but  that  went  off*  very  flat.     She  immediately  conceived  a  very 
low  opinion  of  my  metaphysics  ;  and,  turning  round  to  Mary, 
put  some  question  to  her  in  French — possibly  having  heard 
that  neither  Mary  nor  I  understood  French.     The  explanation 
that    took  place  occasioned  some  embarrassment  and  much 
wondering.     She  then  fell  into  an  insulting  conversation  about 
the  comparative  genius  and  merits  of  all  modern  languages, 
and  concluded  with   asserting  that  the  Saxon  was  esteemed 
the   purest  dialect    in  Germany.      From  thence  she  passed 
into  the  subject  of  poetry  ;  where  I,  who  had  hitherto  sat  mute, 
and  a  hearer  only,  humbly  hoped  1  might  now  put  in  a  word 
to  some  advantage,  seeinjj  that  it  was  mv  own  trade  in  a  man- 
ner.      But  I  was  stopped  by  a  round  assertion  that  no  good 
poetry  had  appeared  since  Dr.  Johnson's  time.     It  seems  the 
doctor  had  suppressed  many  hopeful  geniuses  that  way,  by 
the   severity   of  his  critical  strictures    in  his  '  Lives   of  the 
Poets.'     I  here  ventured  to  question  the  fact,  and  was  begin- 
ning to  appeal  to  names,  but  I  was  assured  '  it  was  certainly 
the  case.'     Then  we  discussed  Miss  More's  book  on  educa- 
tion, which  I  had  never  read.     It  seems  Dr.  Gregory,  another  of 

Miss  B 's  friends,  has  found  fault  with  one  of  Miss  More's 

metaphors.     Miss  More  has  been  at  some  pains  to  vindicate 

herself;   in  the  opinion  of  Miss  B ,  not  without  success. 

It  seems  the  doctor  is  invariably  against  the  use  of  broken  or 
mixed  metaphor,  which  he  reprobates,  against  the  authority  of 
Shakspeare  himself  We  next  discussed  the  question  whether 
Pope  was  a  poet.  I  And  Dr.  Gregory  is  of  opinion  he  was 
not,  though  Miss  Seward  does  not  at  all  concur  with  him  in 
this.      We   then  sat  upon  the  comparative  merits  of  the  ten 

translations    of  '  Pizarro,'  and    Miss    B advised    Mary  to 

lake  two  of  them  home  ;  she  thought  it  might  afford  her  some 
pleasure  to  compare  them  vrrhatim  :  which  we  declined.  It 
being  now  nine  o'clock,  wine  and  macaroons  were  again 
served  round,  and  we  parted,  with  a  promise  to  go  again  next 
week,  and  meet  the  Misses  Porter,  who,  it  seems,  have  heard 


84  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

much  of  Mr.  Coleridge,  and  wish  to  meet  us,  because  we  are 
his  friends.  I  have  been  preparing  for  the  occasion.  I  crowd 
cotton  in  my  ears.  I  read  all  the  reviews  and  magazines  of 
the  past  month  against  the  dreadful  meeting,  and  I  hope  by 
these  means  to  cut  a  tolerable  second-rate  figure. 

•'  Pray  let  us  have  no  more  complaints  about  shadows. 
We  are  in  a  fair  way,  through  you,  to  surfeit  sick  upon  them. 

"  Our  loves  and  respects  to  your  host  and  hostess. 

"  Take  no  thought  about  your  proof-sheets ;  they  shall  be 
done  as  if  Woodfall  himself  did  them.  Pray  send  us  word  of 
Mrs.  Coleridge  and  little  David  Hartley,  your  little  reality. 

"  Farewell,  dear  Substance.  Take  no  umbrage  at  anything 
I  have  written.  v 

'*C.  Lamb. 

"  Umbra. 

"  Land  of  Shadows, 

Shadow-month  the  16th  or  17th,  1800." 

"  Coleridge,  I  find  loose  among  your  papers  a  copy  ol 
Christabel.  It  wants  about  thirty  lines ;  you  will  very  much 
oblige  me  by  sending  the  beginning  as  far  as  that  line — 

'  And  the  spring  comes  slowly  up  this  way ;' 
and  the  intermediate  lines  between — 


'  The  lady  leaps  up  suddenly, 
The  lovely  Lady  Christabel ;' 


and  the  lines — 


'  She  folded  her  arms  beneath  her  cloak, 
And  stole  to  the  other  side  of  the  oak.' 

The  trouble  to  you  will  be  small,  and  the  benefit  to  us  very 
great !  A  pretty  antithesis  !  A  figure  in  speech  I  much  ap- 
plaud. 

"  Godwin  has  called  upon  us.  He  spent  one  evening  here. 
Was  very  friendly.  Kept  us  up  till  midnight.  Drank  punch, 
and  talked  about  you.  He  seems,  above  all  men,  mortified  at 
your  going  away.  Suppose  you  were  to  write  to  that  good- 
natured  heathen  ; 

•  Or  is  he  a  shadow  ?^ 

"  If  I  do  not  write,  impute  it  to  the  long  postage,  of  which 
you  have  so  much  cause  to  complain.  I  have  scribbled  over 
a  queer  letter,  as  I  find  by  perusal,  but  it  means  no  mischief. 

"  I  am,  and  will  be,  yours  ever,  in  sober  sadness, 

'*C.  L. 

"  Write  your  German  as  plain  as  sunshine,  for  that  must 
correct  itself.  You  know  I  am  homo  unius  linguae  ;  in  Eng- 
liifihj  illiterate,  a  dunce,  a  ninny." 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  85 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  How  do  you  like  this  little  epigram  ?  It  is  not  my  wri- 
ting, nor  had  I  any  finger  in  it.  If  you  concur  with  me  in 
thinking  it  very  elegant  and  very  original,  I  shall  be  tempted 
to  name  the  author  to  you.  I  will  just  hint  that  it  is  almost  or 
quite  a  first  attempt. 

[Here  Miss  Lamb's  little  poem  of  Helen  was  introduced.] 

"  By-the-by,  I  have  a  sort  of  recollection  that  somebody,  I 
think  you,  promised  me  a  sight  of  Wordsworth's  tragedy.  I 
should  be  very  glad  of  it  just  now ;  for  I  have  got  Manning 
with  me,  and  should  like  to  read  it  with  him.  But  this,  I  con- 
fess, is  a  refinement.  Under  any  circumstances,  alone,  in 
Cold-Bath  prison,  or  in  the  desert  island,  just  when  Prosper© 
and  his  crew  had^  set  off,  with  Caliban  in  a  cage,  to  Milan,  it 
would  be  a  treat  to  me  to  read  that  play.  Manning  has  read 
it,  so  has  Lloyd,  and  all  Lloyd's  family;  but  I  could  not  get 
him  to  betray  his  trust  by  giving  me  a  sight  of  it.  Lloyd  is 
sadly  deficient  in  some  of  those  virtuous  vices. 

****** 

"  George  Dyer  is  the  only  literary  character  I  am  happily 
acquainted  with.  The  oftener  I  see  him  the  more  deeply  I  ad- 
mire him.  He  is  goodness  itself.  If  I  could  but  calculate 
the  precise  date  of  his  death,  I  would  write  a  novel  on  purpose 
to  make  George  the  hero.     I  could  hit  him  off  to  a  hair." 

The  tragedy  which  Lamb  was  thus  anxious  to  read  has 

been  perseveringly  withheld  from  the  world.     A  fine  passage, 

quoted  in  one  of  Wordsworth's  prose  essays,  make  us  share  in 

his  earnest  curiosity. 

"  Action  is  momentary — 
A  word,  a  blow — the  motion  of  a  muscle  this  way  or  that ; 
Suffering  is  long,  drear,  and  infinite." 

Wordsworth's  genius  is  perhaps  more  fitly  employed  in  thus 
tracing  out  the  springs  of  heroic  passion,  and  developing  the 
profound  elements  of  human  character,  than  in  following  them 
out  through  their  exhibition  in  violent  contest  or  majestic  re- 
pose.     Surely  he  may  now  afford  to  gratify  tlie  world  ! 

The  next  is  a  short  but  characteristic  letter  to  Manning. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

•'  My  dear  fellow  (N.  B.  mighty  familiar  of  late  !),  for  me 
to  come  to  Cambridge  now  is  one  of  Heaven's  impossibilities. 
Metaphysicians  tell  us,  even  it  can  work  nothing  which   im- 
plies a  contradiction.     I  can  explain  this  by  telling  you  that  I 
8 


86  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

am  engaged  to  do  double  duty  (this  hot  weather !)  for  a  man 
who  has  taken  advantage  of  this  very  weather  to  go  and  cool 
himself  in  '  green  retreats'  all  the  month  of  August. 

"  But  for  you  to  come  to  London  instead  !  muse  upon  it,  re- 
volve it,  cast  it  about  in  your  mind.  I  have  a  bed  at  your 
command.  You  shall  drink  rum,  brandy,  gin,  aquavitae,  usque- 
baugh, or  whiskey  a'  nights ;  and  for  the  after  dinner-trick  I 
have  eight  bottles  of  genuine  port,  which,  mathematically  di- 
vided, gives  one  and  one  seventh  for  every  day  you  stay,  pro- 
vided you  stay  a  week.     Hear  John  Milton  sing, 

'  Let  Euclid  rest  and  Archimedes  pause.' 

Twenty-first  Sonnet. 

And  elsewhere, 

'What  neat  repast  shall  feast  us,  light*  and  choice, 
Of  Attic  taste,  with  wine,t  whence  we  may  rise, 
To  hear  the  lute  well  touch'd,  or  artful  voice 
Warble  immortal  notes  and  Tuscan  air  V 

"  Indeed,  the  poets  are  full  of  this  pleasing  mortality — 

*  Veni  cite,  Domine  Manning !' 

"  Think  upon  it.     Excuse  the  paper,  it  is  all  I  have. 

«  C.  Lamb." 

Lamb  now  meditated  a  removal  to  the  home-place  of  his 
best  and  most  solemn  thoughts — the  Temple  ;  and  thus  an- 
nounced it  in  a  letter  to  Manning. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  You  masters  of  logic  ought  to  know  (logic  is  nothing  more 
than  a  knowledge  of  words,  as  the  Greek  etymon  implies) 
that  all  words  are  no  more  to  be  taken  in  a  literal  sense  at  all 
times  than  a  promise  given  to  a  tailor.  When  I  expressed  an 
apprehension  that  you  were  mortally  offended,  I  meant  no 
more  than  by  the  application  of  a  certain  formula  of  effica- 
cious sounds,  which  had  done  in  similar  cases  before,  to  rouse 
a  sense  of  decency  in  you,  and  a  remembrance  of  what  was 
due  to  me  !  You  masters  of  logic  should  advert  to  this  phe- 
nomenon in  human  speech  before  you  arraign  the  usage  oli 
us  dramatic  geniuses.  Imagination  is  a  good  blood-mare,  and 
goes  well ;  but  the  misfortune  is,  she  has  too  many  paths  be- 
fore her.  'Tis  true,  I  might  have  imaged  to  myself  that  you 
had  trundled  your  frail  carcass  to  Norfolk.  I  might  also  and 
did  imagine  that  you  had  not,  but  that  you  were  lazy,  or 
inventing  new  properties  in  a  triangle,  and  for  that  purpose 

*  "  We  poets !  generally  give  light  dinners." 

t  "  No  aoubt  the  poet  here  alludes  to  port-wine  at  38s.  the  dozen," 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  87 

moulding  and  squeezing  Landlord  Crisp's  three-cornered  bea- 
ver into  fantastic  experimental  forms  ;  or,  that  Archimedes 
was  meditating  to  repulse  the  French,  in  case  of  a  Cambridge 
invasion,  by  a  geometric  hurling  of  folios  on  their  red  caps ;  or, 
peradventurc,  that  you  were  in  extremities,  in  great  wants,  and 
just  set  out  for  Trinity-boys  when  my  letters  came.  In  short, 
my  genius  !  (which  is  a  short  word  nowadays  for  what-a- 
great-man-am-I !)  was  absolutely  stifled  and  overlaid  with  its 
own  riches.  Truth  is  one  and  poor,  like  the  cruise  of  Elijah's 
widow.  Imagination  is  the  bold  face  that  multiplies  its  oil ; 
and  thou,  the  old  cracked  pipkin,  that  could  not  believe  it 
could  be  put  to  such  purposes.  Dull  pipkin,  to  have  Elijah 
for  thy  cook.  Imbecile  recipient  of  so  fat  a  miracle.  I  send 
you  George  Dyer's  Poems,  the  richest  production  of  the  lyri- 
cal muse  this  century  can  boast ;  for  Wordsworth's  L.  B.  were 
published,  or  at  least  written,  before  Christmas. 

"Please  to  advert  to  pages  291  to  276  for  the  most  aston- 
ishing account  of  where  Shakspeare's  muse  has  been  all  this 
while.  I  thought  she  had  been  dead,  and  buried  in  Stratford 
Church,  with  the  young  man  that  kept  her  company — 

'  But  it  seems,  like  the  devil, 
Buried  in  Cole  Harbour, 
Some  say  she's  risen  agam, 
Gone  'prentice  to  a  barber.' 

"  N.B. — I  don't  charge  anything  for  the  additional  manu- 
script notes,  which  are  the  joint  productions  of  myself  and  a 
learned  translator  of  Schiller, Stoddart,  Esq. 

"N.B.  the  2d. — I  should  not  have  blotted  your  book,  but 
I  had  sent  my  own  out  to  be  bound,  as  I  was  in  duty  bound. 
A  liberal  criticism  upon  the  several  pieces,  lyrical,  heroical, 
amatory,  and  satirical,  would  be  acceptable.  So  some  think 
there's  not  a  Words — worth  of  good  poetry  in  the  great  L.  B.! 
I  daren't  put  the  dreaded  syllables  at  their  just  length,  for  my 
back  tingles  from  the  northern  castigation. 

"  I  am  going  to  change  my  lodgings,  having  received  a  hint 
that  it  would  be  agreeable,  at  our  Lady's  next  feast.  I  have 
partly  fixed  upon  most  delectable  rooms,  which  look  out  (when 
you  stand  a  tiptoe)  over  the  Thames  and  Surrey  Hills,  at 
the  upper  end  of  King's  Bench  walks,  in  the  Temple.  There 
I  shall  have  all  the  privacy  of  a  house  without  the  encum- 
brance, and  shall  be  able  to  lock  my  friends  out  as  often  as  I 
desire  to  hold  free  converse  with  my  immortal  mind,  for  my 
present  lodgings  resemble  a  minister's  levee,  I  have  so  in- 
creased my  acquaintance  (as  they  call  'em)  since  I  resided  in 
town.  Like  the  town  mouse,  that  had  tasted  a  little  of  urbane 
manners,  I  long  to  be  nibbling  my  own  cheese  by  my  dear 


88  LETTERS  TO    COLERIDGE. 

self,  without  mousetraps  and  timetraps.  By  my  new  plan  I 
shall  be  as  airy,  up  four  pair  of  stairs,  as  in  the  country  ;  and 
in  a  garden,  in  the  midst  of  enchanting,  more  than  Moham- 
medan paradise,  London,  whose  dirtiest  drab-frequented  alley, 
and  her  lowest  bowing  tradesman,  I  would  not  exchange  for 
Skiddaw,  Helvellyn,  James,  Walter,  and  the  parson  into  the 
bargain.  Oh !  her  lamps  of  a  night !  her  rich  goldsmiths, 
printshops,  toyshops,  mercers,  hardwaremen,  pastrycooks ! 
St.  Paul's  churchyard,  the  Strand !  Exeter  Change  !  Charing 
Cross,  with  the  man  upon  a  black  horse  !  These  are  thy  gods, 
oh  London !  An't  you  mightily  moped  on  the  banks  of  the 
Cam  ?  Had  you  not  better  come  and  set  up  here  ?  You  can't 
think  what  a  difference.  All  the  streets  and  pavements  are 
pure  gold,  I  warrant  you.  At  least,  I  know  an  alchymy  that 
turns  her  mud  into  that  metal — a  mind  that  loves  to  be  at 
home  in  crowds. 

"  'Tis  half  past  twelve  o'clock,  and  all  sober  people  ought 
to  be  abed. 

"  C.  Lamb  (as  you  may  guess)." 

The  following  letters  appear  to  have  been  written  during 
Coleridge's  visit  to  Wordsworth. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  By  some  fatality,  unusual  with  me,  I  have  mislaid  the 
list  of  books  which  you  want.  Can  you,  from  memory,  easily 
supply  me  with  another? 

"  I  confess  to  Statins,  and  I  detained  him  wilfully,  out  of  a 
reverend  regard  to  your  style.  Statins,  they  tell  me,  is  turgid. 
As  to  that  other  Latin  book,  since  you  know  neither  its  name 
nor  subject,  your  wants  (I  crave  leave  to  apprehend)  cannot 
be  very  urgent.  Meanwhile,  dream  that  it  is  one  of  the  lost 
Decades  of  Livy. 

"  Your  particularity  to  me  has  led  you  to  form  an  erroneous 
opinion  as  to  the  measure  of  delight  you  suppose  me  to  take 
in  obliging.  Pray  be  careful  that  it  spread  no  farther.  'Tis 
one  of  those  heresies  that  is  very  pregnant.  Pray  rest  more 
satisfied  with  the  portion  of  learning  which  you  have  got,  and 
disturb  my  peaceful  ignorance  as  little  as  possible  with  such 
sort  of  commissions. 

"  Did  you  never  observe  an  appearance  well  known  by  the 
name  of  the  man  in  the  moon?  Some  scandalous  old  maids 
have  set  on  foot  a  report  that  it  is  Endymion. 

"  Your  theory  about  the  first  awkward  step  a  man  makes 
being  the  consequence  of  learning  to  dance,  is  not  univer- 
sal. We  have  known  many  youths  bred  up  in  Christ's  who 
never  learned  to  dance,  vet  the  wo>-i'i   "—^   ' 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  S9 

very  graceful  motions.  I  remember  there  was  little  Hudson, 
the  immortal  precentor  of  St.  Paul's,  to  teach  us  our  quavers ; 
but,  to  the  best  of  my  recollection,  there  was  no  master  of 
motions  when  we  were  at  Christ's. 

"  Farewell,  in  haste.  "  C.  L." 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"  Dear  Wordsworth — I  have  not  forgot  your  commissions. 
But  the  truth  is — and  why  should  I  not  confess  it  ? — I  am  not 
plethorically  abounding  in  cash  at  this  present.  Merit,  Heav- 
en knows,  is  very  little  rewarded ;  but  it  does  not  become  me 
to  speak  of  myself.  My  motto  is,  '  contented  with  little,  yet 
wishing  for  more.'  Now  the  books  you  wish  for  would  re- 
quire some  pounds,  which,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  I  have  not  by 
me  ;  so  I  will  say  at  once,  if  you  will  give  me  a  draught  upon 
your  town  banker  for  any  sum  you  propose  to  lay  out,  I  will 
dispose  of  it  to  the  very  best  of  my  skill  in  choice  old  books, 
such  as  my  own  soul  loveth.  In  fact,  I  have  been  waiting 
for  the  liquidation  of  a  debt  to  enable  myself  to  set  about  your 
commission  handsomely  ;  for  it  is  a  scurvy  thing  to  cry, '  Give 
me  the  money  first,'  and  I  am  the  first  of  the  family  of  the 
Lambs  that  have  done  it  for  many  centuries  ;  but  the  debt  re- 
mains as  it  was,  and  my  old  friend  that  1  accommodated  has 
generously  forgot  it !  The  books  which  you  want  I  calcu- 
late at  about  £8.  Ben  Jonson  is  a  guinea  book.  Beau- 
mont and  Fletcher,  in  folio,  the  right  folio  not  now  to  be  met 
with;  the  octavoes  are  about  J^3.  As  to  any  other  dramatists, 
I  do  not  know  where  to  find  them,  except  what  are  in  Dods- 
ley's  old  plays,  which  are  about  £3  also.  Massinger  I  never 
saw  but  at  one  shop,  but  it  is  now  gone  ;  but  one  of  the  edi- 
tions of  Dodsley  contains  about  a  fourth  (the  best)  of  his  plays. 
Congreve,  and  the  rest  of  King  Charles's  moralists,  are  cheap 
and  accessible.  The  works  on  Ireland  I  will  inquire  after, 
but  I  fear  Spenser's  is  not  to  be  had  apart  from  his  poems ; 
I  never  saw  it.  But  you  may  depend  upon  my  sparing  no 
pains  to  furnish  you  as  complete  a  library  of  old  poets  and 
dramatists  as  will  be  prudent  to  buy  ;  for  I  suppose  you  do 
include  the  £20  edition  of  Hamlet,  single  play,  which  Kem- 
ble  has.  Marlow's  plays  and  poems  are  totally  vanished  , 
only  one  edition  of  Dodsley  retains  one,  and  the  other  two  of 
his  plays  ;  but  John  Ford  is  the  man  after  Shakspeare.  Let 
me  know  your  will  and  pleasure  soon,  for  I  have  observed, 
next  to  the  pleasure  of  buying  a  bargain  for  one's  self  is  the 
pleasure  of  persuading  a  friend  to  buy  it.  It  tickles  one  with  the 
image  of  an  imprudency.  without  the  penalty  usually  annexed. 

"C.'Lamb." 


90  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

[1800.] 
Letters  to  Manning,  after  Lamb's  removal  to  the  Temple. 

In  the  year  1800,  Lamb  carried  into  effect  his  purpose  oi 
removing  to  Mitre-court  Buildings,  Temple.  During  this  time 
he  wrote  only  a  few  small  poems,  which  he  transmitted  to  Man- 
ning. In  his  letters  to  Manning  a  vein  of  wild  humour  breaks 
out,  of  which  there  are  but  slight  indications  in  the  correspond- 
ence with  his  more  sentimental  friends ;  as  if  the  very  oppo- 
sition of  Manning's  more  scientific  power  to  his  own  force  of 
sympathy  provoked  the  sallies  which  the  genial  kindness  of 
the  mathematician  fostered.  The  prodigal  and  reckless  hu- 
mour of  some  of  these  letters  forms  a  striking  contrast  to  the 
deep  feeling  of  the  earlier  letters  to  Coleridge.  His  *  Es- 
says of  Elia'  show  the  harmonious  union  of  both.  The  fol- 
lowing letter  contains  Lamb's  description  of  his  new  abode. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  I  was  not  aware  that  you  owed  me  anything  besides  that 
guinea  ;  but  I  dare  say  you  are  right.  I  live  at  No.  16  Mitre- 
court  Buildings,  a  pistol-shot  off  Baron  Maseres.'  You  must 
introduce  me  to  the  baron.  I  think  we  should  suit  one  an- 
other mainly.  He  lives  on  the  ground  floor,  for  convenience 
of  the  gout ;  I  prefer  the  attic  story,  for  the  air !  He  keeps 
three  footmen  and  two  maids  ;  I  have  neither  maid  nor  laun- 
dress, not  caring  to  be  troubled  with  them  !  His  forte,  I  un- 
derstand, is  the  higher  mathematics  ;  my  turn,  I  confess,  is 
more  to  poetry  and  the  belles  lettres.  The  very  antithesis  of 
our  characters  would  make  up  a  harmony.  You  must  bring 
the  baron  and  me  together.  N.B.  when  you  come  to  see  me, 
mount  up  to  the  top  of  the  stairs — I  hope  you  are  not  asth- 
matical — and  come  in  flannel,  for  it's  pure  airy  up  there.  And 
bring  your  glass,  and  I  will  show  you  the  Surrey  Hills.  My 
bed  faces  the  river,  so  as  by  perking  up  upon  my  haunches, 
and  supporting  my  carcass  with  my  elbows,  without  much 
wrying  my  neck,  I  can  see  the  white  sails  glide  by  the  bottom 
of  the  King's  Bench  walks  as  I  lie  in  my  bed.  An  excellent 
tiptoe  prospect  in  the  best  room;  casement  windows,  with 
Bmall  panes,  to  look  more  like  a  cottage.     Mind,  1  have  got  no 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  91 

bed  for  you,  that's  flat ;  sold  it  to  pay  expenses  of  moving. 
The  very  bed  on  which  Manning  lay  ;  the  friendly,  the  mathe- 
matical Manning  !  How  forcibly  does  it  remind  me  of  the 
interesting  Otway  !  '  The  very  bed  which  on  thy  marriage 
night  gave  thee  into  the  arms  of  Belvidera,  by  the  coarse  hand 
of  ruffians'  (upholsterers'  men),  &c.  My  tears  will  not  give 
me  leave  to  go  on.  But  a  bed  I  will  get  you,  Manning,  on 
condition  you  will  be  my  day  guest. 

"  1  have  been  ill  more  than  a  month  with  a  bad  cold,  which 
comes  upon  me  (like  a  murderer's  conscience)  about  midnight, 
and  vexes  me  for  many  hours.  I  have  successively  been 
drugged  with  Spanish  licorice,  opium,  ipecacuanha,  paregoric, 
and  tincture  of  foxglove  (tinctura  purpuras  digitalis  of  the  an- 
cients).    I  am  afraid  I  must  leave  off  drinking." 

Lamb  then  gives  an  account  of  his  visit  to  an  exhibition  of 
snakes — of  a  frightful  vividness  and  interesting — as  all  details 
of  these  fascinating  reptiles  are,  which  we  at  once  loathe  and 
long  to  look  upon,  as  the  old  enemies  and  tempters  of  our 
race. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

*'  Dear  Manning — Had  you  written  one  week  before  you 
did,  I  certainly  should  have  obeyed  your  injunction ;  you 
should  have  seen  me  before  my  letter.  I  will  explain  to  you 
my  situation.  There  are  six  of  us  in  one  department.  Two 
of  us  (within  these  four  days)  are  confined  with  severe  fevers  ; 
and  two  more,  who  belong  to  the  Tower  Militia,  expect  to 
have  marching  orders  on  Friday.  Now  six  are  absolutely  ne- 
cessary. I  have  already  asked  and  obtained  two  young  hands 
to  supply  the  loss  of  the  feverites ;  and,  with  the  other  pros- 
pect before  me,  you  may  believe  I  cannot  decently  ask  leave 
of  absence  for  myself.  All  1  can  promise  (and  I  do  promise, 
with  the  sincerity  of  Saint  Peter,  and  the  contrition  of  sinner 
Peter  if  I  fail)  that  I  will  come  the  very  fast  spare  week,  and 
go  nowhere  till  I  have  been  at  Cambridge.  No  matter  if  you 
are  in  a  state  of  pupilage  when  I  come  ;  for  I  can  employ  my- 
self in  Cambridge  very  pleasantly  in  the  mornings.  Are  there 
not  libraries,  halls,  colleges,  books,  pictures,  statues?  I  wish 
you  had  made  London  in  your  way.  There  is  an  exhibition 
quite  uncommon  in  Europe,  which  could  not  have  escaped 
your  genius — alive  rattlesnake,  ten  feet  in  length,  and  the 
thickness  of  a  big  leg.  I  went  to  see  it  last  night  by  candle- 
light. We  were  ushered  into  a  room  very  little  bigger  than 
ours  at  Pentonville.  A  man  niid  woman  nnd  four  hovs  live  in 
this  room,  joint  tenants  with  nine  snakes,  most  of  them  such 


92  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

as  no  remedy  has  been  discovered  for  their  bite.  We  walked 
into  the  middle,  which  is  formed  by  a  half-moon  of  wired 
boxes,  all  mansions  of  snakes — whip-snakes,  thunder-snakes, 
pie-nose-snakes,  American  vipers,  and  this  monster.  He  lies 
curled  up  in  folds  ;  and,  immediately  a  stranger  enters  (for  he 
is  used  to  the  family,  and  sees  them  play  at  cards),  he  sets  up 
a  rattle  like  a  watchman's  in  London,  or  near  as  loud,  and 
reared  up  a  head,  from  the  midst  of  these  folds,  like  a  toad, 
and  shook  his  head,  and  showed  every  sign  a  snake  can  show 
of  irritation.  I  had  the  foolish  curiosity  to  strike  the  wires 
with  my  finger,  and  the  devil  flew  at  me  with  his  toad-mouth 
wide  open :  the  inside  of  his  mouth  is  quite  white.  I  had  got  my 
finger  away,  nor  could  he  well  have  bit  me  with  his  big  mouth, 
which  would  have  been  certain  death  in  five  minutes.  But  it 
frightened  me  so  much  that  I  did  not  recover  my  voice  for  a 
minute's  space.  I  forgot,  in  my  fear,  that  he  was  secured. 
You  would  have  forgot  too,  for  'tis  incredible  how  such  a  mon- 
ster can  be  confined  in  small  gauzy-looking  wires.  I  dreamed 
of  snakes  in  the  night.  I  wish  to  Heaven  you  could  see  it. 
He  absolutely  swelled  with  passion  to  the  bigness  of  a  large 
thigh.  I  could  not  retreat  without  infringing  on  another  box, 
and  just  behind,  a  little  devil,  not  an  inch  from  my  back,  had 
got  his  nose  out,  with  some  difficulty  and  pain,  quite  through 
the  bars !  He  was  soon  taught  better  manners.  All  the 
snakes  were  curious,  and  objects  of  terror ;  but  this  monster, 
like  Aaron's  serpent,  swallowed  up  the  impression  of  the 
rest.  He  opened  his  cursed  mouth  when  he  made  at  me  as 
wide  as  his  head  was  broad.  I  hallooed  out  quite  loud,  and 
felt  pains  all  over  my  body  with  the  fright. 

"  I  have  had  the  felicity  of  hearing  George  Dyer  read  out 
one  book  of  '  The  Farmer's  Boy.'  I  thought  it  rather  childish. 
No  doubt  there  is  originality  in  it  (which,  in  your  self-taught 
geniuses,  is  a  most  rare  quality,  they  generally  getting  hold  of 
some  bad  models,  in  a  scarcity  of  books,  and  forming  their 
taste  on  them),  but  no  selection.     All  is  described. 

"  Mind,  I  have  only  heard  read  one  book. 

"  Yours  sincerely, 

"  Philo-Snake, 

"C.  L." 

The  following  are  fragments  from  a  letter  chiefly  on  per- 
sonal matters,  the  interest  of  which  is  gone  by  : — 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  And  now,  when  shall  I  catch  a  glimpse  of  your  honest 
face-lo-face  countenance  again  ?    Your  fine  dogmatical.^  skepti- 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  93 

cal  face  by  punch-light  ?  Oh  !  one  glimpse  of  the  human  face, 
and  shake  of  the  human  hand,  is  better  than  whole  reams  of 
this  cold,  thin  correspondence  ;  yea,  of  more  worth  than  all 
the  letters  that  have  sweated  the  fingers  of  sensibility  from 
Madame  Sevigne  to  Sterne  and  Shenstone. 

"  Coleridge  is  settled  with  his  wife  and  the  young  philoso- 
pher at  Keswick,  with  the  Wordsworths.  They  have  con- 
trived to  spawn  a  new  volume  of  lyrical  ballads,  which  is  to 
see  the  light  in  about  a  month,  and  causes  no  little  excitement 
in  the  literary  world.  George  Dyer,  too,  that  good-natured 
poet,  is  more  than  nine  months  gone  with  his  twin  volumes  of 
ode,  pastoral,  sonnet,  elegy,  Spenserian,  Horatian,  Akensidish, 
and  Masonic  verse  ;  Clio  prosper  the  birth  !  it  will  be  twelve 
shilhngs  out  of  somebody's  pocket.  Well,  God  put  it  into  the 
hearts  of  the  English  gentry  to  come  in  shoals  and  subscribe 
to  his  poems,  for  he  never  put  a  kinder  heart  into  flesh  of  man 
than  George  Dyer's ! 

"  Now  farewell,  for  dinner  is  at  hand. 

"C.  L." 

Lamb  had  engaged  to  spend  a  few  days,  when  he  could 
obtain  leave,  with  Manning  at  Cambridge,  and,  just  as  he  hoped 
to  accomplish  his  wish,  received  an  invitation  from  Lloyd  to 
give  his  holyday  to  the  poets  assembled  at  the  Lakes.  In  the 
joyous  excitement  of  spirits  which  the  anticipated  visit  to  Man- 
ning produced,  he  thus  plays  off  Lloyd's  proposal  on  his  friend, 
abuses  mountains,  and  luxuriates  in  his  love  of  London  : — 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"Dear  Manning — I  have  received  a  very  kind  invitation 
from  Lloyd  and  Sophia  to  go  and  spend  a  month  with  them 
at  the  lakes.  Now  it  fortunately  happens  (which  is  so  seldom 
the  case  !)  that  I  have  spare  cash  by  me,  enough  to  answer 
the  expenses  of  so  long  a  journey ;  and  I  am  determined  to 
get  away  from  the  office  by  some  means.  The  purpose  of 
this  It-tter  is  to  request  of  you  (my  dear  friend),  that  you  will 
not  take  it  unkind  if  I  decline  my  proposed  visit  to  Cambridge 
for  the  present.  Perhaps  I  shall  be  able  to  take  Cambridge 
in  my  icay,  going  or  coming.  I  need  not  describe  to  you  the 
expectations  which  such  a  one  as  myself,  pent  up  all  my  life 
in  a  dirty  city,  have  formed  of  a  tour  to  the  lakes.  Consider, 
Grassmere !  Ambleside!  Wordsworth!  Coleridge!  Hills, 
woods,  lakes,  and  mountains,  to  the  eternal  devil.  I  will  eat 
snipes  with  thee,  Thomas  Manning.  Only  confess,  confess  a 
bite. 

"  P.S.     I  think  you  named  the  16th  ;  but  was  it  not  mod- 


94  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

est  of  Lloyd  to  send  such  an  invitation !  It  shows  his  knowl- 
edge of  money  and  time.     I  would  be  loath  to  think  he  meant 

'  Ironic  satire  sidelong  sklented  on  my  poor  pursie.' 

Burns. 

For  my  part,  with  reference  to  my  friends  northward,  I  am 
not  romance-bit  about  Nature.  The  earth,  and  sea,  and  sky 
(when  all  is  said)  is  but  as  a  house  to  dwell  in.  If  the  in- 
mates be  courteous,  and  good  liquors  flow  like  the  conduits  at 
an  old  coronation,  if  they  can  talk  sensibly  and  feel  properly, 
I  have  no  need  to  stand  staring  upon  the  gilded  looking-glass 
(that  strained  my  friend's  purse-strings  in  the  purchase),  nor 
his  five-shilling  print  over  the  mantelpiece  of  old  Nabbs  the 
carrier  (which  only  betrays  his  false  taste).  Just  as  important 
to  me  (in  a  sense)  is  all  the  furniture  of  my  world;  eye-pam- 
pering, but  satisfies  no  heart.  Streets,  streets,  streets,  markets, 
theatres,  churches,  Covent  Gardens,  shops  sparkling  with 
pretty  faces  of  industrious  milliners,  neat  seamstresses,  ladies 
cheapening,  gentlemen  behind  counters  lying,  authors  in  the 
streets  with  spectacles  (you  may  know  them  by  their  gait), 
lamps  lighted  at  night,  pastrycook  and  silversmith  shops,  beauti- 
ful Quakers  of  Pentonville,  noise  of  coaches,  drowsy  cry  of 
mechanic  watchmen  at  night,  with  bucks  reeling  home  drunk  ; 
if  you  happen  to  wake  at  midnight,  cries  of  fire  ;  and  stop 
thief ;  inns  of  court,  with  their  learned  air,  and  halls,  and  butter- 
ies, just  like  Cambridge  colleges  ;  old  bookstalls,  '  Jeremy 
Taylors,'  '  Burtons  on  Melancholy,'  and  '  Religio  Medicis' 
on   every  stall.     These  are  thy  pleasures,  oh  London  !  with- 

the-many-sins.     Oh  city,  abounding  in ,  for  these  may 

Keswick  and  her  giant  brood  go  hang ! 

"C.  L." 

On  this  occasion  Lamb  was  disappointed ;  but  he  was  con- 
soled by  the  acquisition  of  a  new  friend  in  Mr.  Rickman,  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  and  exults  in  a  strain  which  he  never 
had  reason  to  regret.  This  piece  of  rare  felicity  enabled  him 
even  to  bear  the  loss  of  his  manuscripts  and  the  delay  of  his 
hopes;  which,  according  to  the  old  theatrical  usage,  he  was 
destined  to  endure. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

*^  Enquid  meditatur  Archimedes?  What  is  Euclid  doing? 
What  hath  happened  to  learned  Trismegist  1  Doth  he  take  it 
in  ill  part  that  his  humble  friend  did  not  comply  with  his 
courteous  invitation  ?  Let  it  suffice,  I  could  not  come  ;  are 
impossibilities  nothing?  be  they  abstractions  of  the  intellect? 
or  not  (rather)  most  sharp  and  mortifying  realities  ?  nuts  in 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  95 

the  Will's  mouth  too  hard  for  her  to  crack?  brick  and  stone 
walls  ill  her  way,  which  she  can  by  no  means  eat  through  ? 
sore  lets,  impedimenta  viarum^  no  thoroughfares  ?  racemi  nimium 
alte  pendentcs  ?  Is  the  phrase  classic  ?  I  allude  to  the  grapes 
in  ^sop,  which  cost  the  fox  a  strain,  and  gained  the  world 
an  aphorism.  Observe  the  superscription  of  this  letter.  In 
adapting  the  size  of  the  letters  which  constitute  your  name  and 
Mr.  Cnsp^s  name  respectively,  I  had  an  eye  to  your  differerii 
stations  in  life.  'Tis  truly  curious,  and  must  be  soothing  to 
an  aristocrat.  I  wonder  it  has  never  been  hit  on  before  my 
time.     I  have  made   an  acquisition  lately  of  a  pleasant  hand^ 

one  Rickman,  to  whom  I  was  introduced  by ,  not  the  most 

flattering  auspices  under  which  one  man  can  be  introduced  to 
another ;    George  brings  all  sorts  of  people  together,  setting 
up  a  sort  of  agrarian  law  or  common  property  in  matter  ot 
society  ;  but,  for  once,  he  has  done  me  a  great  pleasure,  while 
he  was  only  pursuing  a  principle,  as  ignes  fatui  may  light  you 
home.     This  Rickman   lives   in  our   buildings,  immediately 
opposite  our  house ;    the  finest  fellow  to  drop  in  a'  nights, 
about  nine  or  ten  o'clock — cold  bread  and  cheese  time — ^just 
in  the  ivishing  time  of  the  night,  when  you  wish  for  somebody 
to  come  in,   without  a  distinct  idea  of  a  probable  anybody- 
Just  in  the  nick,  neither  too  early  to  be  tedious  nor  too  late 
to  sit  a  reasonable  time.     He  is  a  most   pleasant  hand  ;    a 
fine,  rattling  fellow ;  has  gone  through  life  laughing  at  solemn 
apes  ;  himself  hugely  literate,  oppressively  full  of  information 
in  all  stuff  of  conversation,  from  matter  of  fact  to  Xenophon 
and  Plato ;  can  talk  Greek  with  Porson,  politics  with  Thel- 
wall,  conjecture  with  George  Dyer,  nonsense  with  me,  and 
anything  with  anybody  ;  a  great  farmer,  somewhat  concerned 
in  an  agricultural  magazine  ;  reads  no  poetry  but  Shakspeare, 
very  intimate  with  Southey ;  loves  George  Dyer ;  thoroughly 
penetrates  into  the  ridiculous,  wherever  found  ;  understands 
the  first  time  (a  great  desideratum  in  common  minds),  you 
need  never  twice  speak  to  him  ;  does  not  want  explanations, 
translations,  limitations,  as  Professor  Godwin  does  when  yon 
make  an  assertion;    up   to   anything;    down    to    everything; 
whatever  sapit   huminem.      A  perfect  man.      All   this   I'arrago, 
which  must  perplex  you  to  read,  and   has  put  me  to  a  litihi 
trouble  to  select !  ordy  proves  how  impossible  it  is  to  describe 
?i  pleasant  /tand.     You  must  see  Rickman  to  know  him,  for  he 
is  a  species   in  one.     A  new   class.     An  exotic,  any  slip  of 
which  I  am  proud  to  put  in  my  garden-pot.     The  clearest- 
headed   fellow.     Fullest  of  matter,  with  least  verbosity.      If 
there  be  any  alloy  in  my  fortune  to  have  met  with  such  a 
man,  it  is  that  he  commonly  divides  his  time  between  town 


96  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

and  country,  having  some  foolish  family  ties  at  Christchurch, 
by  which  means  he  can  only  gladden  our  London  hemisphere 
with  returns  of  light.     He  is  now  going  for  six  weeks. 

"  At  last  I  have  written  to  Kemble,  to  know  the  event  of  my 
play,  which  was  presented  last  Christmas.  As  I  suspected, 
came  an  answer  back  that  the  copy  was  lost,  and  could  not  be 
found  ;  no  hint  that  anybody  had  to  this  day  ever  looked  into 
it ;  with  a  courteous  (reasonable  !)  request  of  another  copy  (if 
I  had  one  by  me),  and  a  promise  of  a  definitive  answer  in  a 
week.  I  could  not  resist  so  facile  and  moderate  a  demand,  so 
scribbled  out  another,  omitting  sundry  things,  such  as  the 
witch  story,  about  half  of  the  forest  scene  (which  is  leisurely 
for  story),  and  transposing  that  soliloquy  about  England  getting 
drunk,  which,  like  its  reciter,  stupidly  stood  alone,  nothing  pre- 
venient  or  antevenient,  and  cleared  away  a  good  deal  besides, 
and  sent  this  copy,  written  all  out  (with  alterations,  &c.,  re- 
quiring judgment)  in  one  day  and  a  half!  I  sent  it  last  night, 
and  am  in  weekly  expectation  of  the  tolling  bell  and  death- 
warrant. 

"  This  is  all  my  London  news.     Send  me  some  from  the 

banks  of  Cam^  as  the  poets  delight  to  speak,  especially , 

who  has  no  other  name,  nor  idea,  nor  definition  of  Cambridge  ; 
namely,  its  being  a  market  town,  sending  members  to  par- 
liament, never  entered  into  his  definition  ;  it  was  and  is,  sim- 
ply, the  banks  of  the  Cam,  or  the  fair  Cam ;  as  Oxford  is  the 
banks  of  the  Isis,  or  the  fair  Isis.  Yours  in  all  humility,  most 
illustrious  Trismegist, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

("  Read  on,  there's  more  at  the  bottom.) 

"  You  ask  me  about  the  *  Farmer's  Boy' — don't  you  think 
the  fellow  who  wrote  it  (who  is  a  shoemaker)  has  a  poor 
mind  ?  Don't  you  find  he  is  always  silly  about  poor  Giles  and 
those  abject  kind  of  phrases,  which  mark  a  man  that  look  up 
to  wealth?  None  of  Burns's  poet  dignity.  What  do  you 
think?     I  have  just  opened  him,  but  he  makes  me  sick." 

Here  is  a  short  but  characteristic  instance  of  the  humour  of 
the  time. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  Dear  Archimedes — Things  have  gone  on  badly  with  thy 
ungeometrical  friend  ;  but  they  are  on  the  turn.  My  old  house- 
keeper has  showed  signs  of  convalescence,  and  will  shortly  re- 
sume the  power  of  the  keys,  so  I  shan't  be  cheated  of  my  tea 
and  liquors.     Wind  in  the  west,  which  promotes  tranquillity. 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  97 

Have  leisure  now  to  anticipate  seeing  thee  again.  Have  been 
taking  leave  of  tobacco  in  a  rhyming  address.  Had  thought 
that  vein  had  long  since  closed  up.  Find  I  can  rhyme  and 
reason  too.  Think  of  studying  mathematics,  to  restrain  the 
fire  of  my  genius,  which  G.  D.  recommends.  Have  frequent 
bleedings  at  the  nose,  which  shows  plethoric.  Maybe  shall 
try  the  sea  myself,  that  great  scene  of  wonders.  Got  incredi- 
bly sober  and  regular :  shave  oftener,  and  hum  a  tune,  to  sig- 
nify cheerfulness  and  gallantry. 

"  Suddenly  disposed  to  sleep,  having  taken  a  quart  of  peas 
with  bacon,  and  stout.  Will  not  refuse  Nature,  who  has  done 
such  things  for  me  ! 

"  Nurse  !  don't  call  me  unless  Mr.  Manning  comes.  What ! 
the  gentleman  in  spectacles  ?     Yes. 

"  Dor  mi  f. 

"C.  L. 

"  Saturday, 

"  Hot  Noon." 

Constant  to  the  fame  of  Jem  White,  Lamb  did  not  fail  to 
enlist  Manning  among  the  admirers  of  the  "  Falstaff 's  Letter." 
The  next  letter  referring  to  them  is,  however,  more  interest- 
ing for  the  light  which  it  casts  on  Lamb's  indifference  to  the 
politics  of  the  time  and  fond  devotion  to  the  past. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

*'  I  hope  by  this  time  you  are  prepared  to  say  the  '  FalstafTs 
Letters'  are  a  bundle  of  the  sharpest,  queerest,  profoundest  hu- 
mours, of  any  these  juice-drained  latter  times  have  spawned. 
I  should  have  advertised  you  that  the  meaning  is  frequently 
hard  to  be  got  at ;  and  so  are  the  future  guineas  that  now  lie 
ripening  and  aurifying  in  the  womb  of  some  undiscovered  Po- 
los i ;  but  dig,  dig,  dig,  dig,  Manning!  I  set  to,  with  an  un- 
conquerable propulsion  to  write,  with  a  lamentable  want  of 
what  to  write.  My  private  goings  on  are  orderly  as  the  move- 
ments of  the  spheres,  and  stale  as  their  music  to  angels'  ears. 
Public  afTiiirs — except  as  they  touch  upon  me,  and  so  turn  into 
private — I  cannot  whip  up  my  mind  to  feel  any  interest  in.  I 
grieve,  indeed,  that  War,  and  Nature,  and  Mr.  Pitt,  that  hangs 
up  in  Lloyd's  best  parlour,  should  have  conspired  to  call  up 
three  necessaries,  simple  commoners  as  our  fathers  knew  them, 
into  the  upper  liouse  of  luxuries  :  bread,  and  beer,  and  coals, 
Manning.  But  as  to  France  and  Frenchmen,  and  the  Abb6 
Si^yes  and  his  constitutions,  I  cannot  make  these  present  times 
present  to  me.  I  read  histories  of  the  past,  and  I  live  in  them  ; 
although,  to  abstract  senses,  they  are  far  less  momentous  than 

Vol.  L— 9  P 


98  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

the  noises  which  keep  Europe  awake.  I  am  reading  '  Bur- 
net's own  Times.'  Did  you  ever  read  that  garrulous,  pleasant 
history  ?  He  tells  his  story  like  an  old  man  past  political  ser- 
vice, bragging  to  his  sons  on  winter  evenings  of  the  part  he 
took  in  public  transactions  when  '  his  old  cap  was  new.'  Full 
of  scandal,  which  all  true  history  is.  No  palliatives,  but  all 
the  stark  wickedness  that  actually  gives  the  momentum  to  na- 
tional actors.  Quite  the  prattle  of  age  and  outlived  import- 
ance. Truth  and  sincerity  staring  out  upon  you  perpetually  in 
alto  relievo.  Himself  a  party-man,  he  makes  you  a  party-man. 
None  of  the  cursed  philosophical  Humeian  indifference,  so  cold, 
and  unnatural,  and  inhuman  !  None  of  the  cursed  Gibbonian 
fine  writing,  so  fine  and  composite.  None  of  Dr.  Robertson's 
periods  with  three  members.  None  of  Mr.  Roscoe's  sage  re- 
marks, all  so  apposite,  and  coming  in  so  clever,  lest  the  reader 
should  have  had  the  trouble  of  drawing  an  inference.  Burnet's 
good  old  prattle  I  can  bring  present  to  my  mind  ;  I  can  make 
the  revolution  present  to  me — the  French  revolution,  by  a  con- 
verse perversity  in  my  nature,  I  fling  as  faryrom  me.  To  leave 
this  tiresome  subject,  and  to  relieve  you  from  two  or  three  dis- 
mal yawns,  which  I  hear  in  spirit,  I  here  conclude  my  more 
than  commonly  obtuse  letter  ;  dull,  up  to  the  dulness  of  a  Dutch 
commentator  on  Shakspeare. 

"  My  love  to  Loyd  and  to  Sophia,  ' 

"C.  L." 

While  Lamb's  dramatic  destinies  were  in  suspense,  he  was 
called  on  *'  to  assist"  at  the  production  of  a  tragedy,  by  a  friend, 
whose  more  mature  reputation  gave  him  readier  access  to  the 
manager,  but  who  had  no  better  claim  to  success  than  himself. 
Mr.  Godwin,  whose  powerful  romance  of  Caleb  Williams  had 
supplied  the  materials  for  "  The  Iron  Chest"  of  Colman,  nat- 
urally aspired,  on  his  own  account,  to  the  glory  of  the  scene, 
and  completed  a  tragedy  under  the  title  of  "  Antonio,  or  the 
Soldier's  Return,"  which  was  accepted  at  Drury  Lane  Thea- 
tre, and  announced  for  representation  on  Saturday,  the  13th 
December,  in  this  year.  Lamb  supplied  the  epilogue,  which 
he  copied  in  the  following  letter  addressed  to  Manning  on 
the  eventful  day  : — 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  I  have  received  your  letter  tlds  moment^  not  having  been 
at  the  office.  I  have  just  time  to  scribble  down  the  epilogue. 
To  your  last  epistle  I  will  just  reply,  that  I  will  certainly  come 
to  Cambridge  before  January  is  out :  I'll  come  when  I  can. 
You  shall  have  an  emended  copy  of  my  play  early  next  week. 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  99 

Mary  thanks  you  ;  but  her  handwriting  is  too  feminine  to  be 
exposed  to  a  Cambridge  gentleman,  though  I  endeavour  to 
persuade  her  that  you  understand  algebra,  and  must  understand 
her  hand.  Tlie  play  is  the  man's  you  wot  of ;  but,  for  Heav- 
en's sake,  do  not  mention  it ;  it  is  to  come  out  in  a  feigned 
name,  as  one  Tobin's.  I  will  omit  the  introductory  lines 
"which  connect  it  with  the  play,  arid  give  you  the  concluding 
tale,  which  is  the  mass  and  bulk  of  the  epilogue'.  The  name 
is  Jack  Incident.  It  is  about  promise-breaking  ;  you  will  see 
it  all  if  you  read  the  papers. 

Jack,  of  dramatic  genius  justly  vain, 

Purchased  a  renter's  share  at  Drury  Lane  ; 

A  prudent  man  m  every  other  matter, 

Known  at  his  club-room  tor  an  honest  hatter  ; 

Humane  and  courteous,  led  a  civil  life, 

And  has  been  seldom  known  to  beat  his  wife ; 

But  Jack  is  now  grown  quite  another  man. 

Frequents  the  green  room,  knows  the  plot  and  plan 
Of  each  new  piece. 

And  has  been  seen  to  talk  with  Sheridan ! 

In  at  the  playhouse  just  at  six  be  pops, 

And  never  leaves  u  till  the  curtain  drops, 

Is  never  absent  on  the  author's  night, 

Knows  actresses  and  actors  too  — by  sight; 

So  humble,  that  with  Suett  he'll  confer. 

Or  take  a  pipe  with  plain  Jack  Bannister; 

Nay,  with  an  author  has  been  known  so  free, 

He  once  suggested  a  catastrophe  ; 

In  short,  John  dabbled  till  his  head  was  turn'd. 

His  wife  remonstrated,  his  neighbours  mourn'd, 

His  customers  were  dropping  olf  apace, 

And  Jack's  affairs  began  to  wear  a  piteous  face. 
One  night  his  wife  began  a  curtain-lecture  ; 

'  My  dearest  Johnny,  husband,  spouse,  protector, 
Take  pity  on  your  helpless  babes  and  me, 
Save  us  from  ruin,  you  from  bankruptcy  ; 
Look  to  your  business,  leave  these  cursed  plays, 
And  try  again  your  old  industrious  ways.' 

Jack,  who  was  always  scared  at  the  Gazette, 
And  had  some  bits  of  scull  uninjured  yet. 

Promised  amendment,  vow'd  his  wife  spake  reason, 
'He  would  not  see  another  play  that  season.' 

Three  stubborn  fortnights  Jack  his  promise  kept, 
Was  late  and  early  in  his  shop,  eat,  slept. 
And  waik'd  and  taik'd,  like  ordinary  men; 
No  wU,  but  John  the  hatter  once  again  ; 
Visits  lus  chil)  :   when  lo  I   one  fatal  night 
His  wife  with  horror  view'd  the  well-known  sight — 
John's  hat,  wig,  snuff  box —vn'.\[  she  knew  his  tricks — 
And  Jack  decain[)iiig  at  the  hour  ot  si.x. 
Just  at  the  counter's  edge  a  playbill  lay. 
Announcing  that  '  Pizarro'  was  the  play  ; 

'  Oh  Johnny,  Johnny,  this  is  your  old  doing.'  ' 

Qucjth  Jack,  '  Why,  wtial  the  devil  storm's  a-brewing? 
About  a  harmless  play  why  all  this  Iright  ? 
I'll  go  and  see  it,  if  it's  but  for  spite  ; 
Zounds,  woman  !  Nelson's*  to  be  there  to-night.' 

*  "  A  good  clap-trap.     Nelson  has  exhibited  two  or  three  times  at  both  the- 
atres, and  advertised  himself" 

E  2 


100  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

"  N.B. — This  was  intended  for  Jack  Bannister  to  speak ; 
but  the  sage  managers  have  chosen  Miss  Heard,  except  Miss 
Tidsweil,  the  worst  actress  ever  seen  or  heard.  Now  I  re- 
member 1  have  promised  the  loan  of  my  play.  I  will  lend 
it  instantly,  and  you  shall  get  it  ('pon  honour !)  by  this  day 
week. 

"  I  must  go  and  dress  for  the  boxes  !  First  night !  Find- 
ing I  have  time,  I  transcribe  the  rest.  Observe,  you  have  read 
the  last  first ;  it  begins  thus  : — The  names  i  took  from  a  lit- 
tle outline  G.  gave  me.     I  have  not  read  the  play  ! 

Ladies,  ye've  seen  how  Guzman's  consort  died, 

Poor  victim  of  a  Spaniard  brother's  pride, 

When  Spanish  honour  through  the  world  was  blown, 

And  Spanish  beauty  for  the  best  was  known.* 

In  that  romantic,  unenlightened  time, 

A  breach  of  promisej  was  a  sort  of  crime  ; 

Which  of  you  handsome  English  ladies  here, 

But  deems  the  penance  bloody  and  severe  ? 

A  whimsical  old  SaragossaJ  fashion, 

That  a  dead  father's  dying  inclination 

Should  live  to  thwart  a  living  daughter's  passion,*^ 

Unjustly  on  the  sex  we\\  men  exclaim, 

Rail  at  your%  vices,  and  commit  the  same  ; 

Man  is  a  promise  breaker  from  the  womb, 

And  goes  a  promise-breaker  to  the  tomb  ; 

What  need  we  instance  here  the  lover's  vow, 

The  sick  man's  purpose,  or  the  great  man's  bow  ?** 

The  truth  by  few  examples  best  is  shown. 

Instead  of  many  which  are  better  known  ; 

Take  poor  Jack  Incident's  that's  dead  and  gone. 

Jack,  &c.,  (fee,  &c. 

"  Now  you  have  it  all — how  do  you  like  it  ?  I  am  going  to 
see  it  recited  !  ! !" 

Alas  or  human  hopes  !  The  play  was  decisively  damned, 
and  the  epilogue  shared  its  fate.  The  tragedy  turned  out  a 
miracle  of  dulness  for  the  world  to  wonder  at,  although  Lamb 
always  insisted  it  had  one  fine  line,  which  he  was  fond  of  re- 
peating— sole  relic  of  the  else  forgotten  play.  Kemble  and 
Mrs.  Siddons,  the  brother  and  sister  of  the  drama,  toiled  through 
four  acts  and  a  half  without  applause  or  disapprobation  ;  one 
speech  was  not  more  vapid  than  another  ;  and  so  dead  was  the 
level  of  the  dialogue,  that,  although  its  destiny  was  seen  from 
afar,  it  presented  no  opportunity  for  hissing.  But  as  the  play 
drew  towards  a  close,  when,  after  a  scene  of  frigid  chiding 
not  vivified  by  any  fire  of  Kemble's  own,  Antonio  drew  his 
sword  and  plunged  it  into  the  heroine's  bosom,  the  "  sad  ci- 
vility" of  the  audience  vanished,  they  started  as  at  a  real  mur- 
der, and  hooted  the   actors  from  the  stage.     "  Philosophy," 

*  "  Four  easy  lines."  +  "  For  which  the  heroine  died.'" 

X  ''In  Spain  ir  <j  "  Two  nefl<  lines."  |1  '' Or  you." 

%  "  Or  our,  as  they  have  altered  it."  **  "Antithesis  ! !" 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  101 

which  could  not  "  make  a  Juliet,"  sustained  the  author  through 
the  trial.  He  sat  on  one  of  the  front  benches  of  the  pit,  un- 
moved amid  the  storm.  When  the  first  act  passed  off  without 
a  hand,  he  expressed  his  satisfaction  at  the  good  sense  of  the 
house  ;  "  the  proper  season  of  applause  had  not  arrived  ;"  all 
was  exactly  as  it  should  be.  The  second  act  proceeded  to 
its  close  in  the  same  uninterrupted  calm  ;  his  friends  became 
uneasy,  but  still  his  optimism  prevailed ;  he  could  afford  to 
wait.  And  though  he  did  at  last  admit  the  great  movement 
was  somewhat  tardy,  and  that  the  audience  seemed  rather  pa- 
tient than  interested,  he  did  not  lose  his  confidence  till  the 
tumult  arose,  and  then  he  submitted  with  quiet  dignity  to  the 
fate  of  genius,  too  lofty  to  be  understood  by  a  world  as  yet  in 
its  childhood  !  Notwithstanding  this  rude  repulse,  iMr.  God- 
win retained  his  taste  for  the  theatre  to  the  last.  On  every 
first  night  of  a  new  piece,  whether  tragedy,  comedy,  or  farce, 
whether  of  friend  or  foe,  he  sat  with  gentle  interest  in  a  side 
box,  and  bore  its  fate,  whatever  it  might  be,  with  resignation, 
as  he  had  done  his  own.  The  following  is  Lamb's  account  of 
the  catastrophe  rendered  to  Manning,  in  which  the  facetious 
charge  against  the  unlucky  author  of''  Violent  and  Satanical 
Pride  of  Heart"  has  reference  to  some  banter  which  Lamb 
had  encountered  among  his  friends  by  the  purposed  title  of  his 
own  play,  "  Pride's  Cure,"  and  his  disquisition  in  its  defence. 

TO    MR,    MANNING. 

"  We  are  damned!  Not  the  facetious  epilogue  itself  could 
save  us.  For,  as  the  editor  of  the  Morning  Post,  quick-sighted 
gentleman  !  hath  this  morning  truly  observed  (I  beg  pardon  if 
I  falsify  his  words,  their  profound  sense  I  am  sure  I  retain), 
both  prologue  and  epilogue  were  worthy  of  accompanying 
such  a  piece  ;  and,  indeed  (mark  the  profundity.  Mister  Man- 
ning), were  received  with  proper  indignation  by  such  of  the 
audience  only  as  thought  either  worth  attending  to.  Professor, 
thy  glories  wax  dim  !  Again,  the  incomparable  author  of  the 
True  Briton  declareth  in  his  paper  (bearing  same  date)  that 
the  epilogue  was  an  indifferent  attempt  at  humour  and  charac- 
ter, and  failed  in  both.  I  forbear  to  mention  the  other  papers, 
because  I  have  not  read  them.  Oh  Professor,  how  different 
thy  feelings  now  (quantum  mutatus  ab  illo  professore,  qui  in 
agris  philosophic  tantas  victorias  acquisivisti)  ;  how  different 
thy  proud  feelings  but  one  little  week  ago  ;  thy  anticipation  of 
thy  nine  nights  ;  those  visionary  claps,  which  have  soothed  thy 
soul  by  day  and  thy  dreams  by  night !  Callin«j  in  accidentally 
on  the  Professor  while  he  was  out,  I  was  ushered  into  the  study; 
and  my  nose  quickly  (most  sagacious  always)  pointed  me  to  four 
9* 


102  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

tokens  lying  loose  upon  thy  table,  Professor,  which  indicated 
the  violent  and  satanical  pride  of  heart.  Imprimis,  there 
caught  mine  eye  a  list  of  six  persons,  thy  friends,  whom  thou 
did  meditate  inviting  to  a  sumptuous  dinner  on  the  Thursday, 
anticipating  the  profits  of  thy  Saturday's  play  to  answer 
charges  ;  1  was  in  the  honoured  file  !  Next,  a  stronger  evi- 
dence of  thy  violent  and  almost  satanical  pride,  lay  a  list  of 
all  the  morning  papers  (from  the  Morning  Chronicle  down- 
ward to  the  Porcupine),  with  the  places  of  their  respective 
offices,  where  thou  wast  meditating  to  insert,  and  didst  insert, 
an  elaborate  sketch  of  the  story  of  thy  play  ;  stones  in  thy  en- 
emy's hand  to  bruise  thee  with,  and  severely  wast  thou  bruised, 
oh  Professor  !  nor  do  I  know  what  oil  to  pour  into  thy  wounds. 
Next — which  convinced  me,  to  a  dead  conviction,  of  thy  pride, 
violent  and  almost  satanical  pride — lay  a  list  of  books,  which 
thy  un-tragedy-favoured  pocket  could  never  answer  ;  Dodsley's 
old  plays,  Malone's  Shakspeare  (still  harping  upon  thy  play, 
thy  philosophy  abandoned  meanwhile  to  superstitious  minds)  ; 
nay,  I  believe  (if  I  can  believe  my  memory),  that  the  ambi- 
tious Encyclopaedia  itself  was  part  of  thy  meditated  acquisi- 
tions ;  but  many  a  playbook  was  there.  All  these  visions 
are  damned;  and  thou.  Professor,  must  read  Shakspeare  in 
future  out  of  a  common  edition  ;  and,  hark  ye,  pray  read  him 
to  a  little  better  purpose  !  Last  and  strongest  against  thee  (in 
colours  manifest  as  the  hand  upon  Belshazzar's  wall)  lay  a 
volume  of  poems  by  C.  Lloyd  and  C.  Lamb.  Thy  heart  mis- 
gave thee  that  thy  assistant  might  possibly  not  have  talent 
enough  to  furnish  thee  an  epilogue  !  Manning,  all  these  things 
came  over  my  mind ;  all  the  gratulations  that  would  have 
thickened  upon  him,  and  even  some  have  glanced  aside  upon 
his  humble  friend  ;  the  vanity,  and  the  fame,  and  the  profits 
(the  Professor  is  500Z.  ideal  money  out  of  pocket  by  this  fail- 
ure, besides  200/.  he  would  have  got  for  the  copyright) ;  and 
now  to  muse  upon  thy  altered  physiognomy,  thy  pale  and 
squalid  appearance  'a  kind  of  blue  sickness  about  the  eyelids), 
and  thy  crest  fallen,  and  thy  proud  demand  of  200/.  from  thy 
bookseller  changed  to  an  uncertainty  of  his  taking  it  at  all,  or 
giving  thee  full  50/.  The  Professor  has  won  my  heart  by  this 
his  mournful  catastrophe.  You  remember  Marshall,  who  dined 
with  him  at  my  house  ;  I  met  him  in  the  lobby  immediately 
after  the  damnation  of  the  Professor's  play,  and  he  looked  to 
me  like  an  angel ;  his  face  was  lengthened,  and  all  over  per- 
spiration ;  I  never  saw  such  a  care-fraught  visage  ;  I  could 
have  hugged  him,  I  loved  him  so  intensely.  '  From  every  pore 
of  him  a  perfume  fell.'  1  have  seen  that  man  in  many  situa- 
tions, and,  from  my  soul,  I  think  that  a  more  godlike,  honest 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  103 

soul  exists  not  in  this  world.  The  Professor's  poor  nerves 
trembling  with  the  recent  shock,  he  hurried  him  away  to  my 
house  to  supper,  and  there  we  comforted  him  as  well  as  we 
could.  He  came  to  consult  me  about  a  change  of  catas- 
trophe ;  but,  alas  !  the  piece  was  condemned  long  before  that 
crisis.  I  at  hrst  humoured  him  with  a  specious  proposition, 
but  hav^  since  joined  his  true  friends  in  advising  him  to  give 
it  up.     He  did  it  with  a  pang,  and  is  to  print  it  as  his. 

"  L." 

In  another  letter,  a  few  days  after.  Lamb  thus  recurs  to  the 
subject,  and  closes  the  century  in  anticipation  of  a  visit  to  his 
friend  at  Cambridge. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  As  for  the  Professor,  he  has  actually  begun  to  dive  into 
Tavernier  and  Chardin's  Persian  Travels  for  a  story  to  form 
a  new  drama  for  the  sweet  tooth  of  this  fastidious  age.  Has 
not  Bethlehem  College  a  fair  action  for  nonresidence  against 
such  professors  ?  Are  poets  so  few  in  this  age  that  he  must 
write  poetry  ?  Is  morals  a  subject  so  exhausted  that  he  must 
leave  that  line  ?  Is  the  metaphysic  well  (without  a  bottom) 
drained  dry  ? 

"  If  I  can  guess  at  the  wicked  pride  of  the  Professor's  heart, 
I  would  take  a  shrewd  wager  that  he  disdains  ever  again  to 
dip  his  pen  in  prose.  Adieu,  ye  splendid  theories  !  Fare- 
well, dreams  of  political  justice  !  Lawsuits,  where  I  was 
counsel  for  Archbishop  Fenelon  versus  my  own  mother,  in  the 
famous  fire  cause  ! 

"  Vanish  from  my  mind,  professors,  one  and  all.  I  have 
metal  more  attractive  on  foot. 

"  Man  of  many  snipes,  I  will  sup  with  thee,  Deo  volente, 
et  diabolo  nolente,  on  Monday  night,  the  5th  of  January,  in  the 
new  year,  and  crush  a  cup  to  the  infant  century. 

"A  word  or  two  of  my  progress.  Embark  at  six  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  with  a  fresh  gale,  on  a  Cambridge  one-decker ; 
very  cold  till  eight  at  night;  land  at  St.  Mary's  lighthouse, 
muffins  and  coffee  upon  table  (or  any  other  curious  production 
of  Turkey,  or  both  Indies),  snipes  exactly  at  nine,  punch  to 
commence  at  ten,  with  argument  ;  diflference  of  opinion  is 
expected  to  take  place  about  eleven  ;  perfect  unanimity,  with 
some  haziness  and  dimness,  before  twelve.  N.B.  My  single 
affection  is  not  so  singly  wedded  to  snipes  ;  but  the  curious 
and  epicurean  eye  would  also  take  a  pleasure  in  btholding  a 
delicate   and  well-chosen  assortment  of  teals,  ortolans,   the 


104  -    "JOHN    WOODVIL." 

unctious  and  palate-soothing  flesh  of  geese,  wild  and  tame, 
nightingales'  brains,  the  sensorium  of  a  young  sucking  pig,  or 
any  other  Christmas  dish,  which  I  leave  to  the  judgment  of 
you  and  the  cook  of  Gonville. 

"  C.  Lamb." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

[1801  to  1804.] 

John  Woodvil  Rejected,  Published,  and  Reviewed — Letters  to  Manning, 
Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge. 

The  ominous  postponement  of  Lamb's  theatrical  hopes  was 
followed  by  their  disappointment  at  the  commencement  of  the 
century.  He  was  favoured  with  at  least  one  interview  by  the 
stately  manager  of  Drury  Lane,  Mr.  Kemble,  who  extended 
his  highbred  courtesy  even  to  authors,  whom  he  invariably  at- 
tended to  the  door  of  his  house  in  Great  Russell-street,  and 
bade  them  "  beware  of  the  step."  Godwin's  catastrophe  had 
probably  rendered  him  less  solicitous  to  encounter  a  similar 
peril;  which  the  fondest  admirers  of  "John  Woodvil"  will 
not  regret  that  it  escaped.  While  the  occasional  roughness 
of  its  verse  would  have  been  felt  as  strange  to  ears  as  yet  un- 
used to  the  old  dramatists  whom  Lamb's  Specimens  had  not 
then  made  familiar  to  the  town,  the  delicate  beauties  enshrined 
within  it  would  scarcely  have  been  perceived  in  the  glare  of 
the  theatre.  Exhibiting  "  the  depth,  and  not  the  tumults  of 
the  soul ;"  presenting  a  female  character  of  modest  and  retiring 
loveliness  and  noble  purpose,  but  undistracted  with  any  vio- 
lent emotion ;  and  developing  a  train  of  circumstances  which 
work  out  their  gentle  triumphs  on  the  heart  only  of  the  hero, 
without  stirring  accident  or  vivid  grouping  of  persons,  it  would 
scarcely  have  supplied  sufficient  of  coarse  interest  to  disarm 
the  critical  spirit  which  it  would  certainly  have  encjuntered 
in  all  its  bitterness.  Lamb  cheerfully  consoled  himself  by 
publishing  it ;  and,  at  the  close  of  the  year  1801,  it  appeared 
in  a  small  volume,  of  humble  appearance,  with  the  "  Frag- 
ments of  Burton"  (to  which  Lamb  alluded  in  one  of  his  previ- 
ous letters),  two  of  his  quarto  ballads,  and  the  "  Helen"  of 
his  sister. 

The  daring  peculiarities  attracted  the  notice  of  the  Edin- 
burgh reviewers,  then  in  the  infancy  of  their  slashing  career, 


EDINBURGH    REVIEW.  105 

and  it  was  immolated,  in  due  form,  by  the  self-constituted 
judges,  who,  taking  for  their  motto  "  Judex  damnatur  cum  no- 
cens  ahsohitur^''''  treated  our  author  as  a  criminal  convicted 
of  publishing,  and  awaiting  his  doom  from  their  sentence. 
With  ihe  gay  recklessness  of  power,  at  once  usurped  and  ir- 
responsible, they  introduced  Lord  Mansfield's  wild  construc- 
tion of  the  law  of  libel  into  literature  ;  like  him,  holding  every 
prima  facie  guilty  who  should  be  caught  in  the  act  of  pub- 
lishing a  book,  and  referring  to  the  court  to  decide  whether  sen- 
tence should  be  passed  on  him.  The  article  on  "John  Wood- 
vil,"  which  adorned  their  third  number,  is  a  curious  example 
of  the  old  style  of  criticism  vivified  by  the  impulses  of  youth. 
We  wonder  now,  and  probably  the  writer  of  the  article,  if  he  is 
living,  will  wonder  with  us,  that  a  young  critic  should  seize 
on  a  little  eighteen-penny  book,  simply  printed,  without  any 
preface  ;  make  elaborate  merriment  of  its  outline,  and,  giving 
no  hint  of  its  containing  one  profound  thought  or  happy  ex- 
pression, leave  the  reader  of  the  review  at  a  loss  to  suggest  a 
motive  for  noticing  such  vapid  absurdities.  This  article  is 
written  in  a  strain  of  grave  banter,  the  theme  of  which  is  to 
congratulate  the  world  on  having  a  specimen  of  the  rudest 
condition  of  the  drama,  "  a  man  of  the  age  of  Thespis."  "  At 
length,"  says  the  reviewer,  "  even  in  composition  a  mighty 
veteran  has  been  born.  Older  than  iEschylus,  and  with  all 
the  spirit  of  originality,  in  an  age  of  poets  who  had  before 
them  the  imitations  of  some  thousand  years,  he  comes  for- 
ward to  establish  his  claim  to  the  ancient  hircus.  and  to  sa- 
tiate the  most  remote  desires  of  the  philosophic  antiquary." 
On  this  text  the  writer  proceeds,  selecting  for  his  purpose 
whatever,  torn  from  its  context,  appeared  extravagant  and 
crude,  and  ending  without  the  slightest  hint  that  there  is  merit 
or  promise  of  merit  in  the  volume.  There  certainly  was  no 
malice  or  desire  to  give  pain  in  all  this;  it  was  merely  the 
rrsultof  the  thoughtless  adoption,  by  lads  of  gayely  and  talents, 
of  the  old  critical  canons  of  the  monthly  reviews,  which  had 
been  accustomed  to  damn  all  works  of  unpatronised  genius  in 
a  more  summary  way  and  after  a  duller  fashion.  'I'hese  very 
critics  wrought  themselves  into  good-nature  as  they  broke  into 
deeper  veins  of  thought;  grew  gentler  as  they  grew  wiser; 
and  sometimes,  even  when,  like  Balaam,  they  came  to  curse, 
like  him,  they  ended  with  "  blessing  altogether,"  as  in  the  re- 
view of  the  "Excursion,"  which,  beginning  in  the  old  strain, 
"  This  will  never  do,"  proceeded  to  give  examplrs  of  its  no- 
blest passages,  and  to  grace  them  with  worthiest  eulogy.  And 
now,  the  spirit  of  the  writers  thus  ridiculed,  especially  of 
Wordsworth,  breathes  through  the  pages  of  this  very  review, 


106  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

and  they  not  seldom  wear  the  "  rich  embroidery"  of  the  lan- 
guage of  the  poet  once  scoffed  at  by  their  literary  corporation 
as  too  puerile  for  the  nursery. 

Lamb's  occasional  connexion  with  newspapers  introduced 
him  to  some  of  the  editors  and  contributors  of  that  day,  who 
sought  to  repair  the  spirit  wasted  by  perpetual  exertion  in  the 
protracted  conviviality  of  the  evening,  and  these  associates 
sometimes  left  poor  Lamb  with  an  aching  head,  and  a  purse 
exhausted  by  the  claims  of  their  necessities  upon  it.  Among 
those  was  Fenwick,  immortalized  as  the  Bigod  of  *'  Elia," 
who  edited  several  ill-fated  newspapers  in  succession,  and 
was  the  author  of  many  libels,  which  did  his  employers  no 
good  and  his  majesty's  government  no  harm.  'I'hese  con- 
nexions will  explain  some  of  the  allusions  in  the  following 
letters. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  I  heard  that  you  were  going  to  China,*  with  a  commis- 
sion from  the  Wedgwoods  to  collect  hints  for  their  pottery, 
and  to  teach  the  Chinese  perspective.  But  I  did  not  know 
that  London  lay  in  your  way  to  Pekin.  I  am  seriously  glad 
of  it,  for  I  shall  trouble  you  with  a  small  present  for  the  Em- 
peror of  Usbeck  Tartary,  as  you  go  by  his  territories  ;  it  is  a 
fragment  of  a  '  Dissertation  on  the  state  of  political  parties  in 
England  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,'  which  will,  no 
doubt,  be  very  interesting  to  his  Imperial  Majesty.  It  was 
written  originally  in  English  for  the  use  of  the  two-amd-twenti/ 
readers  of  '  The  Albion'  (this  calculation  includes  a  printer, 
four  pressmen,  and  a  devil) ;  but,  becoming  of  no  use  when 
'  'I'he  Albion'  stopped,  I  got  it  translated  into  Usbeck  Tartar 
by  my  good  friend  Tibet  Kulm,  who  is  come  to  London  with 
a  civil  invitation  from  the  Cham  to  the  English  nation  to  go 
over  to  the  worship  of  the  Lama. 

*'  '  The  Albion'  is  dead ;  dead  as  nail  in  door;  and  my  rev- 
enues have  died  with  it ;  but  I  am  not  as  a  man  without  hope. 
I  have  got  a  sort  of  an  opening  to  '  The  Morning  Chronicle  ! !  !' 
Mr.  Manning,  by  means  of  that  common  dispenser  of  benevo- 
lence. Mister  Dyer.  1  have  not  seen  Perry,  the  editor,  yet; 
but  I  am  preparing  a  specimen.  Shall  have  a  difficult  job  to 
manage,  for  you  must  know  that  Mr.  Perry,  in  common  with 
tlie  great  body  of  the  whigs,  thinks  '  The  Albion'  very  low. 
I  find  I  must  rise  a  peg  or  so,  be  a  little  more  decent,  and  less 
abusive  ;  for,  to  confess  the  truth,  I  had  arrived  to  an  abomi- 

*  Mr.  Manning  had  begun  to  be  haunted  with  the  idea  of  China,  and  to  talk 
of  going  thither,  which  he  accomphshed  some  years  afterward,  without  any 
motive  but  a  desire  to  see  that  great  nation. 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  107 

nable  pitch ;  I  spared  neither  age  nor  sex  when  my  cue  was 
given  me.  N'lmporte  (as  they  say  in  French),  any  climate 
will  suit  me.  So  you  are  about  to  bring  your  old  face-making 
face  to  London.  You  could  not  come  in  a  better  time  for  my 
purposes  ;  for  I  have  just  lost  Rickman,  a  faint  idea  of  whose 
character  I  sent  you.  He  is  gone  to  Ireland  for  a  year  or  two, 
to  make  his  fortune  ;  and  I  have  lost  by  his  going  what  seems 
to  me  I  never  can  recover — a  finished  man.  His  memory  will 
be  to  me  as  the  brazen  serpent  to  the  Israelites  ;  I  shall  look 
up  to  it  to  keep  me  upright  and  honest.  But  he  may  yet 
bring  back  his  honest  face  to  England  one  day.  I  wish  your 
affairs  with  the  Emperor  of  China  had  not  been  so  urgent^ 
that  you  might  have  stayed  in  Great  Britain  a  year  or  two  longer, 
to  have  seen  him  ;  for,  judging  from  my  own  experience,  I 
almost  dare  pronounce  you  never  saw  his  equal.  I  never 
saw  a  man  that  could  be  at  all  second  or  substitute  for  him 
in  any  sort. 

"  Imagine  that  what  is  here  erased  was  an  apology  and 
explanation,  perfectly  satisfactory,  you  may  be  sure  !  for  rating 

this  man  so  highly  at  the  expense  of ,  and ,  and , 

and  M ,  and ,  and ,  and .     But  Mr.  Burke  has 

explained  this  phenomenon  of  our  nature  very  prettily  in  his 
letter  to  a  member  of  the  National  Assembly,  or  else  in  his 
appeal  to  the  old  Whigs,  I  forget  which  ;  do  you  remember  an 
instance  from  Homer  (who  understood  these  matters  tolerably 
well)  of  Priam  driving  away  his  other  sons  with  expressions 
of  wrath  and  bitter  reproach,  when  Hector  was  just  dead. 

"  I  live  where  I  did  in  a  private  manner,  because  I  don't 
like  state.  Nothing  so  disagreeable  to  me  as  the  clamours 
and  applauses  of  the  mob.  For  this  reason  I  live  in  an  obscure 
situation  in  one  of  the  courts  of  the  Temple. 

"C  L." 


"  I  send  you  all  of  Coleridge's  letters*  to  me  which  I  have 
preserved  :  some  of  them  are  upon  the  subject  of  my  play.  I 
also  send  you  Kemble's  two  letters,  and  the  prompter's  cour- 
teous epistle,  with  a  curious  critique  on  '  Pride's  Cure,  by  a 
young  Physician  from  Edinbko',  '  who  modestly  suggests 
quite  another  kind  of  plot.  These  are  monuments  of  my  dis- 
appointment which  I  like  to  preserve. 

"  In  Coleridge's  letters  you  will  find  a  good  deal  of  amuse- 
ment, to  see  genuine  talent  struggling  against  a  pompous  dis- 

*  Lamb  afterward,  in  some  melancholy  mood,  destroyed  all  Coleridge's  let- 
ters, and  was  so  vexed  with  what  he  had  done  that  he  never  preserved  any 
letters  which  he  received  afterward 


108  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

play  of  it.  I  also  send  you  the  Professor's  letter  to  me  (careful 
professor !  to  conceal  his  name  even  from  his  correspondent), 
ere  yet  the  Professor's  pride  was  cured.  Oh  !  monstrous  and 
almost  satanical  pride ! 

**  You  will  carefully  keep  all  (except  the  Scotch  Doctor's 
which  burn)  in  statu  quo,  till  I  come  to  claim  mine  own. 

'*C.  Lamb." 

The  following  is  in  reply  to  a  pressing  invitation  from  Mr 
Wordsworth  to  visit  him  at  the  Lakes. 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"I  ought  before  this  to  have  replied  to  your  very  kind  invi- 
tation into  Cumberland.  With  you  and  your  sister  I  could 
gang  anywhere ;  but  I  am  afraid  whether  I  shall  ever  be  able 
to  afford  so  desperate  a  journey.  Separate  from  the  pleasure 
of  your  company,  I  don't  now  care  if  I  never  see  a  mountain 
in  my  life.  1  have  passed  all  my  days  in  London,  until  I  have 
formed  as  many  and  intense  local  attachments  as  any  of  you 
mountaineers  can  have  done  with  dead  nature.  The  lighted 
shops  of  the  Strand  and  Fleet-street,  the  innumerable  trades, 
tradesmen,  and  customers,  coaches,  wagons,  playhouses  ;  all 
the  bustle  and  wickedness  round  about  Covent  Garden  ;  the 
watchmen,  drunken  scenes,  rattles  ;  life  awake,  if  you  awake, 
at  all  hours  of  the  night ;  the  impossibility  of  being  dull  in 
Fleet-street ;  the  crowds,  the  very  dirt  and  mud,  the  sun 
shining  upon  houses  and  pavements,  the  printshops,  the  old 
bookstalls,  parsons  cheapening  books,  coffee-houses,  steams 
of  soups  from  kitchens,  the  pantomimes — London  itself  a  pan- 
tomime and  masquerade — all  these  things  work  themselves 
into  my  mind,  and  feed  me  without  a  power  of  satiating  me. 
The  wonder  of  these  sights  impel  me  into  night-walks  about 
her  crowded  streets,  and  I  often  shed  tears  in  the  motley 
Strand  from  fulness  of  joy  at  so  much  life.  All  these  emo- 
tions must  be  strange  to  you ;  so  are  your  rural  emotions  to 
me.  But  consider,  what  must  I  have  been  doing  all  my  life 
not  to  have  lent  great  portions  of  my  heart  with  usury  to  such 
scenes  ? 

"  My  attachments  are  all  local,  purely  local ;  I  have  no  pas- 
sion (or  have  had  none  since  I  was  in  love,  and  then  it  was 
the  spurious  engendering  of  poetry  and  books)  to  groves  and 
valleys.  The  rooms  where  I  was  born,  the  furniture  which 
has  been  before  my  eyes  all  my  life,  a  bookcase  which  has  fol- 
lowed me  about,  like  a  faithful  dog  (only  exceeding  him  in 
knowledge),  wherever  I  have  moved  ;  old  chairs,  old  tables, 
streets,  squares,  where  1  have  sunned  myself,  my  old  school — 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  109 

thes^Pare  my  mistresses — have  I  not  enough  without  your 
mountains  ?  I  do  not  envy  you.  I  should  pity  you  did  I  not 
know  that  the  mind  will  make  friends  of  anything.  Your 
sun,  and  moon,  and  skies,  and  hills,  and  lakes  afiect  me  no 
more,  or  scarcely  come  to  me  in  more  venerable  characters, 
than  as  a  gilded  room  with  tapestry  and  tapers,  where  I  might 
live  with  handsome  visible  objects.  I  consider  the  clouds 
above  me  but  as  a  roof  beautifully  painted,  but  unable  to  sat- 
isfy the  mind  ;  and  at  last,  like  the  pictures  of  the  apartment 
of  a  connoisseur,  unable  to  afibrd  him  any  longer  a  pleasure. 
So  fading  upon  me,  from  disuse,  have  been  the  beauties  of 
Nature,  as  they  have  been  confinedly  called  ;  so  ever  fresh, 
and  green,  and  warm  are  all  the  inventions  of  men  and  assem- 
blies of  men  in  this  great  city.  I  should  certainly  have  laughed 
with  dear  Joanna.* 

"  Give  my  kindest  love  and  my  sister's  to  D.  and  yourself. 
And  a  kiss  from  me  to  little  Barbara  Lewthwaite.f  Thank 
you  for  liking  my  play ! 

»'C.  L." 

The  next  two  letters  were  written  to  Manning  when  on  a 
tour  upon  the  Continent. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Apropos.,  I  think  you  wrong  about  my  play.  All  the 
omissions  are  right  ;  and  the  supplementary  scene,  in  which 
Sandford  narrates  the  manner  in  which  his  master  is  affected, 
is  the  best  in  the  book.  It  stands  where  a  hodgepodge  of 
German  puerilites  used  to  stand.  I  insist  upon  it  that  you 
like  that  scene.  Love  me,  love  that  scene.  1  will  now  trans- 
cribe the  '  Londoner'  (No.  1),  and  wind  up  all  with  affection 
and  humble  servant  at  the  end." 

[Here  was  transcribed  the  essay  called  "  The  Londoner," 
which  was  published  some  years  afterward  in  "  The  Reflec- 
tor," and  which  forms  part  of  Lamb's  collected  works.]  He 
then  proceeds  : — 

"  *  What  is  all  this  about  V  said  Mrs.  Shandy.  '  A  story  of 
a  cock  and  a  bull,'  said  Yorick  :  and  so  it  is  ;  but  Manning 
will  take  good-naturedly  what  God  icill  send  him  across  the 
water;  only  1  hope  he  won't  shut  his  eyes  and  opc7i  his  ynouth, 
as  the  children  say,  for  that  is  the  way  to  gape  and  not  to  read. 

*  Alluding  to  the  inscriptions  of  Wordsworth's,  entitled  "Joanna,"  con- 
taining a  magnificent  description  of  the  effects  of  laughter  echouig  amid  the 
great  mountains  of  Westmoreland. 

+    .Mhiding  to  Wordsworth's  poem,  "The  Pet  Lamb." 
10 


110  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

Manning,  continue  your  laudable  purpose  of  making  mgf^our 
register.  I  will  render  back  all  your  remarks  ;  and  /,  notyou^ 
shall  have  received  usury  by  having  read  them.  In  the  mean 
time,  may  the  Great  Spirit  have  you  in  his  keeping,  and  pre- 
serve our  Englishman  from  the  inoculation  of  frivolity  and 
sin  upon  French  earth. 

"  Allons  (or  what  is  it  you  say),  instead  o{ good-by  ? 

*'  Mary  sends  her  kind  remembrance,  and  covets  the  re- 
marks equally  with  me. 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  Monday,  15th  February,  1802." 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

My  dear  Manning — I  must  positively  write,  or  I  shall  miss 
you  at  Toulouse.  I  sit  here  like  a  decayed  minute-hand  (I  lie  ; 
that  does  not  sit),  and  being  myself  the  exponent  of  no  time, 
take  no  heed  how  the  clocks  about  me  are  going.  You  pos- 
sibly, by  this  time,  may  have  explored  all  Italy,  and  toppled 
unawares  into  Etna,  while  you  went  too  near  those  rotten- 
jawed,  gap-toothed,  old  worn-out  chaps  of  hell,  while  I  am 
meditating  a  quiescent  letter  to  the  honest  postmaster  of 
Toulouse.  But,  in  case  you  should  not  have  heew  felo  de  se, 
this  is  to  tell  you  that  your  letter  was  quite  to  my  palate  ;  in 
particular,  your  just  remarks  upon  Industry,  cursed  Industry 
(though  indeed  you  left  me  to  explore  the  reason),  were  highly 
relishing.  I've  often  wished  I  lived  in  the  golden  age,  when 
shepherds  lay  stretched  upon  flowers — the  genius  there  is  in  a 
man's  natural,  idle  face,  that  has  not  learned  his  multiplication 
table !  before  doubt,  and  propositions,  and  corollaries  got  into 

the  world! 

****** 

"  Apropos  :  if  you  should  go  to  Florence  or  Rome,  inquire 
what  works  are  extant  in  gold,  silver,  bronze,  or  marble,  of 
Benvenuto  Cellini,  a  Florentine  artist,  whose  Life,  doubtless, 
you  have  read  ;  or,  if  not,  without  controversy  you  must  read, 
so  hark  ye,  send  for  it  immediately  from  Lane's  circulating 
library.  It  is  always  put  among  the  romances,  very  properly  ; 
but  you  have  read  it,  I  suppose.  In  particular,  inquire  at  Flor- 
ence for  his  colossal  bronze  statue  (in  the  grand  square,  or 
somewhere)  of  Perseus.  You  may  read  the  story  in  '  Tooke's 
Pantheon.'  Nothing  material  has  transpired  in  these  parts. 
Coleridge  has  indited  a  violent  philippic  against  Mr.  Fox  in 
the  '  Morning  Post,'  which  is  a  compound  of  expressions  of 
humility,  gentleman-ushering-in  most  arrogant  charges.  It 
will  do  Mr.  Fox  no  real  injury  among  those  that  know  him." 


LETTER    TO    COLERIDGE.  HI 

In  the  summer  of  1802,  Lamb,  in  company  with  his  sister, 
visited  the  lakes,  and  spent  three  weeks  with  Coleridge  at 
Keswick.  There  he  also  met  the  true  annihilator  of  the  slave- 
trade,  Thomas  Clarkson,  who  was  then  enjoying  a  necessary 
respite  from  his  stupendous  labours,  in  a  cottage  on  the  borders 
of  Ulswater.  Lamb  had  no  taste  for  oratorical  philanthropy  ; 
but  he  felt  the  grandeur  and  simplicity  of  Clarkson's  character, 
and  appreciated  the  unexampled  self-denial  with  which  he 
steeled  his  heart,  trembling  with  nervous  sensibility,  to  endure 
intimate  acquaintance  with  the  foulest  details  of  guilt  and 
wickedness  which  he  lived,  and  could  have  died  to  abolish. 
Wordsworth  was  not  in  the  lake-country  during  Lamb's  visit ; 
but  he  made  amends  by  spending  some  time  in  town  after 
Lamb's  return,  and  then  left  it  for  Yorkshire  to  be  married. 
Lamb's  following  letters  show  that  he  made  some  advances 
towards  fellowship  with  the  hills  which  at  a  distance  he  had 
treated  so  cavalierly  ;  but  his  feelings  never  heartily  associated 
with  "  the  bare  earth,  and  mountains  bare,"  which  sufficed 
Wordsworth  ;  he  rather  loved  to  cleave  to  the  little  hints  and 
suggestions  of  nature  in  the  midst  of  crowded  cities.  In  his 
latter  years  I  have  heard  him,  when  longing  after  London 
among  the  pleasant  fields  of  Enfield,  declare  that  his  love  of 
natural  scenery  would  be  abundantly  satisfied  by  the  patches 
of  long  waving  grass  and  the  stunted  trees  that  blacken  in 
the  old-churchyard  nooks  which  you  may  yet  find  bordering 
on  Thames-street. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

1802. 

"  Dear  Coleridge — I  thought  of  not  writing  till  we  had  per- 
formed some  of  our  commissions  ;  but  we  have  been  hindered 
from  setting  about  them,  which  yet  shall  be  done  to  a  tittle. 
We  got  home  very  pleasantly  on  Sunday.  Mary  is  a  good 
deal  fatigued,  and  finds  the  difference  of  going  to  a  place  and 
coming  from  it.  I  feel  that  I  shall  remember  your  mountains 
to  the  last  day  I  live.  They  haunt  me  perpetually.  I  am 
like  a  man  who  has  been  falling  in  love  unknown  to  himself, 
which  he  finds  out  when  he  leaves  the  lady.  I  do  not  remem- 
ber any  very  strong  impression  while  they  were  present ;  but, 
being  gone,  their  mementoes  are  shelved  in  my  brain.  We 
passed  a  very  pleasant  little  time  with  the  Clarksons.  The 
Wordsworlhs  are  at  Montague's  rooms,  near  neighbours  to 
us.*     They  dined  with  us  yesterday,  and  I  was  their  guide 

to  Bartlemy  fair !" 

•  *  *  «  •  • 

*  Mr.  Basil  Montague  and  his  lady,  who  were,  during  Lamb's  life,  among 
his  mo.st  cordial  and  most  honoured  friends. 


112  LETTER    TO    MANNING. 


TO    MR.    MANNING. 


"24th  Sept.,  1802,  London. 
"  My  dear  Manning — Since  the  date  of  my  last  letter  I 
have  been  a  traveller.  A  strong  desire  seized  me  of  visiting 
remote  regions.  My  first  impulse  was  to  go  and  see  Paris. 
It  was  a  trivial  objection  to  my  aspiring  mind,  that  I  did  not 
understand  a  word  of  the  language,  since  I  certainly  intend 
some  time  in  my  life  to  see  Paris,  and  equally  certainly  intend 
never  to  learn  the  language  ;  therefore  that  could  be  no  objec- 
tion. However,  I  am  very  glad  I  did  not  go,  because  you  had 
left  Paris  (I  see)  before  I  could  have  set  out.  I  believe,  Stod- 
dart  promising  to  go  with  me  another  year  prevented  that 
plan.  My  next  scheme  (for  to  my  restless  ambitious  mind 
London  was  become  a  bed  of  thorns)  was  to  visit  the  far-famed 
peak  in  Derbyshire,  where  the  Devil  sits,  they  say,  without 
breeches.  This  my  purer  mind  rejected  as  indelicate ;  and 
my  final  resolve  was  a  tour  to  the  lakes.  I  set  out  with  Mary 
to  Keswick,  without  giving  Coleridge  any  notice,  for  my  time, 
being  precious,  did  not  admit  of  it.  He  received  us  with  all 
the  hospitality  in  the  world,  and  gave  up  his  time  to  show  us 
all  the  wonders  of  the  country.  He  dwells  upon  a  small  hill 
by  the  side  of  Keswick,  in  a  comfortable  house,  quite  envel- 
oped on  all  sides  by  a  net  of  mountains  :  great  floundering 
bears  and  monsters  they  seemed,  all  couchant  and  asleep. 
We  got  in  in  the  evening,  travelling  in  a  post-chaise  from 
Penrith,  in  the  midst  of  a  gorgeous  sunshine,  which  transmuted 
all  the  mountains  into  colours,  purple,  &:c.,  &;c.  We  thought 
we  had  got  into  fairy  land.  But  that  went  off  (and  it  never 
came  again ;  while  we  stayed  we  had  no  more  fine  sunsets) ; 
and  we  entered  Coleridge's  comfortable  study  just  in  the  dusk, 
when  the  mountains  were  all  dark  with  clouds  upon  their 
heads.  Such  an  impression  I  never  received  from  objects  of 
sight  before,  nor  do  I  suppose  that  I  can  ever  again.  Glori- 
ous creatures,  fine  old  fellows,  Skiddaw,  &;c.  I  never  shall 
forget  ye,  how  ye  lay  about  that  night,  like  an  intrenchment ; 
gone  to  bed,  as  it  seemed,  for  the  night,  but  promising  that  ye 
were  to  be  seen  in  the  morning.  Coleridge  had  got  a  blazing 
fire  in  his  study,  which  is  a  large,  antique,  ill-shaped  room, 
with  an  oldfashioned  organ,  never  played  upon,  big  enough 
for  a  church,  shelves  of  scattered  folios,  an  Eolian  harp,  and 
an  old  sofa,  half  bed,  &c.  And  all  looking  out  upon  the  fa- 
ding view  of  Skiddaw  and  his  broad-breasted  brethren :  what 
a  night !  Here  we  stayed  three  full  weeks,  in  which  time  I  vis- 
ited Wordsworth's  cottage,  where  we  stayed  a  day  or  two  with 


LETTER    TO    MANNING.  113 

the  Clarksons  (good  people,  and  most  hospitable,  at  whose 
house  we  tarried  one  day  and  night),  and  saw  Lloyd.  The 
AVordsworths  were  gone  to  Calais.  They  have  since  been  in 
London,  and  passed  much  time  with  us  :  he  is  now  gone 
into  Yorkshire  to  be  married.  So  we  have  seen  Keswick, 
Grasmere,  Ambleside,  Ulsvvater,  (where  the  Clarksons  live), 
and  a  place  at  the  other  end  of  Ulswater,  I  forget  the  name,* 
to  which  we  travelled  on  a  very  sultry  day,  over  the  middle 
of  Helvellyn.  We  have  clambered  up  to  the  top  of  Skiddaw, 
and  I  have  waded  up  the  bed  of  Lodore.  In  fine,  I  have  satis- 
fied myself  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  that  which  tourists 
call  romantic,  which  I  very  much  suspected  before  :  they  make 
such  a  spluttering  about  it,  and  toss  their  splendid  epithets 
around  them,  till  they  give  as  dim  a  light  as  at  four  o'clock 
next  morning  the  lamps  do  after  an  illumination.  Mary  was 
excessively  tired  when  she  got  about  half  way  up  Skiddaw, 
but  we  came  to  a  cold  rill  (than  which  nothing  can  be  imagined 
more  cold,  running  over  cold  stones),  and  with  the  re-enforce- 
ment of  a  draught  of  cold  water  she  surmounted  it  most  man- 
fully. Oh,  its  fine  black  head,  and  the  bleak  air  atop  of  it, 
M'ith  a  prospect  of  mountains  all  about  and  about,  making  you 
giddy  ;  and  then  Scotland  afar  off,  and  the  border  countries 
so  famous  in  song  and  ballad !  It  was  a  day  that  will  stand 
out  like  a  mountain,  I  am  sure,  in  my  life.  But  I  am  returned 
(I  have  now  been  come  home  near  three  weeks — I  was  a 
month  out),  and  you  cannot  conceive  the  degradation  I  felt  at 
first,  from  being  accustomed  to  wander  as  free  as  air  among 
mountains,  and  bathe  in  rivers  without  being  controlled  by  any 
one,  to  come  home  and  work.  I  felt  very  little.  I  had  been 
dreaming  I  was  a  very  great  man  ;  but  that  is  going  off,  and 
I  find  I  shall  conform,  in  time,  to  that  state  of  life  to  which  it 
has  pleased  God  to  call  me.  Besides,  after  all,  Fleet-street 
and  the  Strand  are  better  places  to  live  in  for  good  and  all 
than  amid  Skiddaw.  Still,  I  turn  back  to  those  great  places 
where  I  wandered  about,  participating  in  their  greatness. 
After  all,  I  could  not  live  in  Skiddaw.  I  could  spend  a  year, 
two,  three  years  among  them,  but  I  must  have  a  prospect  of 
seeing  Fleet-street  at  the  end  of  that  time,  or  I  should  mope 
afld  pine  away,  I  know.  Still,  Skiddaw  is  a  fine  creature. 
My  habits  are  changing,  I  think,  i.  e.,  from  drunk  to  sober. 
Whether  I  shall  be  happier  or  no  remains  to  be  proved.  I 
shall  certainly  be  more  happy  in  a  morning;  but  whether  I 
shall  not  sacrifice  the  fat,  and  the  marrow,  and  the  kidneys, 
i.  e.,  the  night,  glorious  care-drowning  night,  that  heals  all 

*  Patterda!e. 
10* 


114  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

our  wrongs,  pours  wine  into  our  mortifications,  changes  the 
scene  from  indifferent  and  flat  to  bright  and  brilliant !  Oh 
Manning,  if  I  should  have  formed  a  diabolical  resolution,  by 
the  time  you  come  to  England,  of  not  admitting  any  spirituous 
liquors  into  my  house,  will  you  be  my  guest  on  such  shame- 
worthy  terms  ?  Is  life,  with  such  limitations,  worth  trying  ? 
The  truth  is,  that  my  liquors  bring  a  nest  of  friendly  harpies 
about  my  house,  who  consume  me.  This  is  a  pitiful  tale  to 
be  read  at  St.  Gothard,  but  it  is  just  now  nearest  my  heart. 
F is  a  ruined  man.  He  is  hiding  himself  from  his  credi- 
tors, and  has  sent  his  wife  and   children   into  the  country. 

,  my  other  drunken  companion  (that  has  been  :  nam  hie 

casstus  artemque  repono),  is  turned  editor  of  a  Naval  Chronicle. 
Godwin  continues  a  steady  friend,  though  the  same  facility 
does  not  remain  of  visiting  him  often.  Holcroft  is  not  yet 
come  to  town.  I  expect  to  see  him,  and  will  deliver  your 
message.  Things  come  crowding  in  to  say,  and  no  room  for 
'em.  Some  things  are  too  little  to  be  told,  i.  e.,  to  have  a 
preference  ;  some  are  too  big  and  circumstantial.  Thanks 
ibr  yours,  which  was  most  delicious.  Would  I  had  been  with 
you,  benighted,  cfec.  I  fear  my  head  is  turned  with  wandering. 
I  shall  never  be  the  same  acquiescent  being.  Farewell ;  write 
again  quickly,  for  I  shall  not  like  to  hazard  a  letter,  not  know- 
ing where  the  fates  have  carried  you.  Farewell,  my  dear 
fellow. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

Lamb  was  fond  of  Latin  composition  when  at  school,  and 

was   then  praised   for  it.     He  was  always  fond  of  reading 

w-'        Latin  verse,  and  late  in  life  taught  his  sister  to  read  it.     About 

this  time  he  hazarded  the  following  Latin  letter  to  Coleridge. 

of  whose  classical  acquirements  he  stood  in  awe. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Carolus  Agnus  Coleridgio  suo  S. 
"Carissime — Scribis,  ut  nummos  scilicet  epistolarios  solvam 
et  postremo  in  Tartara  abeam :  immo  tu  potius  Tartaricum 
(ut  aiunt)  deprehendisti,  qui  me  vernacula  me&  lingua  pro 
scriba  conductitio  per  tot  annos  satis  eleganter  usum  ad  Latine 
impure  et  canino  fere  ore  latrandum  pertuasmet  epistolas  bene 
compositas  et  concinnatas  percellire  studueris.  Conabor  ta- 
men  :  Attamen  vereor,  ut^des  istas  nostri  Christi,  inter  quas 
tantS,  diligently  magistri  improba  bonis  literulis,  quasi  per 
clysterem  quendam  injectis,  infri  supraque  olim  penitus  im- 
butus  fui,  Barnesii  et  Marklandii  doctissimorum  virorum  nomin- 
ibus  adhuc  gaudentes,  barbarismis  meis  peregrinis  et  aliunde 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  115 

quspsitis  valde  dehonestavero.  Sed  pergere  quocunque  placet. 
Adeste  igitur,  quotquot  estis,  conjugationum  declinationumve 
tiinnae,  terribilia  spectra,  et  tu  imprimis  ades,  Umbra  et  Imago 
maxima  obsoletas  (Diis  gratiae)  Virgae,  qua.  novissime  in  men- 
tem  recepta,  horrescunt  subitd  natales,  et  parum  deest  quo 
minus  braccas  meas  ultro  usque  ad  crura  demittam,  et  ipse 
puer  pueriliter  ejulem. 

"  Isia  tua  Carmina  Chamouiana  satis  grandia  esse  mihi 
cimstat ;  sed  hoc  mihi  nonnihil  displicet,  quod  in  iis  illae  mon- 
tium  Grisosonum  inter  se  responsiones  totidem  reboant  anglic^, 
Gud,  God,  baud  aliter  atque  temet  audivi  tuas  montes  Cumbri- 
anas  resonare  docentes,  Tod,  Tod,  nempe  Doctorem  infelicem  : 
vocem  certe  haud  Deum  Sonantem.     Pro  ceteris  plaudo. 

-'  Itidem  comparationes  istas  tuas  satis  callidas  et  lepidas 
certe  novi :  sed  quid  hoc  ad  verum?  cum  ilii  Consulari  viro  et 
mentf-m  irritabilem  istum  Julianum  ;  et  etiam  astutias  frigidu- 
Ins  quasdem  Augusto  propriores,  nequaquam  congruenter  uno 
afflatu  comparationis  causa  insedisse  affirmaveris  :  iiecnon 
nescio  quid  similiiudinis  etiam  cum  Tiberio  tertio  in  loco  soli- 
ciie  produxeris.  Quid  tibi  equidem  cum  uno  vel  altero  Csesare, 
cum  universi  Duodecicm  ad  comparationes  tuas  se  ultro  tule- 
rint?    Preeterea.  vetustati  adnutans,  comparationes  iniquas  odi. 

"  Istas  VVordsworthianas  nuptias  (vel  potius  cujusdam  Ed- 
mnndii  tui)  te  retulisse  mirificum  gaudeo.  Valeas,  Maria, 
fortunata  nimium,  et  antiquae  illaj  Mariae  Virgini  (comparati- 
one  plusquam  Caesareana)  forsitan  comparanda,  quoniam  '  beata 
inter  mulieres  :'  et  etiam  fortasse  Wordsworthium  ipsum  tuum 
mariium  :  Angelo  Salutatori  asquare  fas  erit,  quoniam  e  Coelo 
(ut  ille)  descendunt  et  Musae  et  ipsae  Musicolae  :  at  Words-, 
worthium  Musarum  observantissimum  semper  novi.  Necnon 
te  qiioque  affinitate  hac  nova,  Dorothea,  gratulor  :  et  tu  certe 
alterum  donum  Dei. 

*'  Istum  Ludum,  quern  tu,  Coleridgi,  Americanum  garris,  a 
Ludo  (ut  liudi  sunt)  maxime  abhorrentem  praetereo:  nempe 
quid  ad  F^udum  attinet,  totius  illae  gentis  Columbianae,  a  nostra 
gente,  eadem  stirpe  orta,  ludi  singuli  causa  voluntatem  perpe- 
ram  alienare  ?     Qua)SO  ego  maleriam  hub  :   te  Bella  ingeris. 

"  Denique  valeas,  et  quid  de  Latinitate  mea  putes,  dicas: 
facias  ut  opossum  ilium  nostrum  volarUem  vel  (ut  lu  malis) 
qiiendam  Piscem  errabundum,  a  me  salvum  et  pulchorrinium 
esse  jubeas.  Valeant  uxor  tua  cum  Flarlleiio  nostro.  Soror 
mea  salva  est  et  ego  :  vos  et  ipsa  salvere  jubet.  Ullerius 
progrediri  non  liquet:   homo  sum  aeratus. 

"  P.S.  Pene  mihi  exciderat,  apud  mo  esse  I^ibrorum  a 
Johatino  Miltono  Latino  scriplorum  vohimina  duo.  (lujc  (Deo 
volente)  cum  caBteris  tiiis  libris  ocyus  citii'is  per  Maria  ad  te 


116  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

missura  curabo :  sed  me  in  hoc  tali  genere  rerum  nullo  mode 
festinantem  novisti  :  habes  confitentem  reum.  Hoc  solum 
dici  restat,  praedicta  volumina  pulchra  esse  et  omnia  opera 
Latina  J.  M.  in  se  continere.  Circa  defensionem  istam  Pro 
Pop°.  Ang'-^.  acerrimam  in  praesens  ipse  praeclaro  gaudio 
moror. 

*' Jussa  tua  Stuartina  faciam  ut  diligenter  colam. 
"  Iterum  iterumque  valeas  : 

"  Et  facias  memor  sis  nostri." 

The  publication  of  the  second  volume  of  the  "  Anthology" 
gave  occasion  to  the  following  letter  : — 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE 

"In  the  next  edition  of  the  'Anthology'  (which  Phoebus 
avert,  and  those  nine  other  wandering  maids  also  !)  please  to 
blot  out  gentle-hearted,  and  substitute  drunken-dog,  ragged 
head,  seld-shaven,  odd-eyed,  stuttering,  or  any  other  epithet 
which  truly  and  properly  belongs  to  the  gentleman  in  question. 
And  for  Charles  read  Tom,  or  Bob,  or  Richard,  for  mere  del- 
icacy. Hang  you,  I  was  beginning  to  forgive  you,  and  believe 
in  earnest  that  the  lugging  in  of  my  proper  name  was  purely 
unintentional  on  your  part,  when,  looking  back  for  further  con- 
viction, stares  me  in  the  face  Charles  Lamb  of  the  India 
House.  Now  I  am  convinced  it  was  all  done  in  malice,  heaped, 
sack-upon-sack,  congregated,  studied  malice.  You  dog  !  your 
141st  page  shall  not  save  you.  I  own  I  was  just  ready  to 
acknowledge  that  there  is  a  something  not  unlike  good  poetry 
in  that  page,  if  you  had  not  run  into  the  unintelligible  abstrac- 
tion-fit about  the  manner  of  the  Deity's  making  spirits  perceive 
his  presence.  God,  nor  created  thing  alive,  can  receive  any 
honour  from  such  thin,  show-box  attributes.  By-the-by,  where 
did  you  pick  up  that  scandalous  piece  of  private  history  about 
the  angel  and  the  Duchess  of  Devonshire  ?  If  it  is  a  fiction 
of  your  own,  why  truly  it  is  a  very  modest  one  for  you.  Now 
I  do  affirm  that  Lewti  is  a  very  beautiful  poem.  J  was  in 
earnest  when  I  praised  it.  It  describes  a  silly  species  of  one 
not  the  wisest  of  passions ;  therefore  it  cannot  deeply  affect 
a  disenthralled  mind.  But  such  imagery,  such  novelty,  such 
delicacy,  and  such  versification,  never  got  into  an  '  Anthology' 
before.  I  am  only  sorry  that  the  cause  of  all  the  passionate 
complaint  is  not  greater  than  the  trifling  circumstance  of  Lewti 
being  out  of  temper  one  day.  Gaulberto  certainly  has  con- 
siderable originality,  but  sadly  wants  finishing.  It  is,  as  it  is, 
one  of  the  very  best  in  the  book.  Next  to  Lewti  I  like  the 
Raven,  which  has  a  good  deal  of  humour.     1  was  pleased  to 


! 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  117 

see  it  again,  for  you  once  sent  it  me,  and  I  have  lost  the  letter 
which  contained  it.  Now  I  am  on  the  subject  of  Anthologies, 
I  must  say  I  am  sorry  the  old  pastoral  way  is  fallen  into  dis- 
repute. The  gentry  which  now  endite  sonnets  are  certainly 
the  legitimate  descendants  of  the  ancient  shepherds.  The 
same  simpering  face  of  description,  the  old  family  face,  is 
visibly  continued  in  the  line.  Some  of  their  ancestors'  labours 
are  yet  to  be  found  in  Allan  Ramsay's  and  Jacob  'I'onson's 
Miscellanies.  But  miscellanies  decaying,  and  the  old  pastoral 
way  dying  of  mere  want,  their  successors  (driven  from  their 
paternal  acres)  nowadays  settle  and  live  upon  Magazines  and 
Anthologies.  This  race  of  men  are  uncommonly  addicted 
to  superstition  :  some  of  them  are  idolators  and  worship  the 
moon  ;  others  deify  qualities,  as  love,  friendship,  sensibility  ; 
or  bare  accidents,  as  Solitude.  Grief  and  Melancholy  have 
their  respective  altars  and  temples  among  them,  as  the  hea- 
thens builded  theirs  to  Mors,  Febris,  Pallor,  &c.  They  all 
agree  in  ascribing  a  peculiar  sanctity  to  the  number  fourteen. 
One  of  their  own  legislators  affirmeth,  that  whatever  exceeds 
that  number  '  encro'acheth  upon  the  province  of  the  elegy ;' 
vice  versa,  whatever  '  cometh  short  of  that  number  abutteth 
upon  the  premises  of  the  epigram.'  I  have  been  able  to  dis- 
cover but  few  images  in  their  temples,  which,  like  the  caves 
of  Delphos  of  old,  are  famous  for  giving  echoes.  They  impute 
a  religious  importance  to  the  letter  O,  whether  because  by  its 
roundness  it  is  thought  to  typify  the  moon,  the  principal  god- 
dess, or  for  its  analogies  to  their  own  labours,  all  ending  where 
they  began,  or  for  what  other  high  and  mystical  reference  I 
have  never  been  able  to  discover,  but  I  observe  they  never 
begin  with  invocations  to  their  gods  without  it,  except,  indeed, 
one  insignificant  sect  among  them,  who  use  the  Doric  A, 
pronounced  like  Ah!  broad,  instead.  These  boast  to  have 
restored  the  old  Dorian  mood. 

"C.  L." 


The  following  letter  imbodies  in  strong  language  Lamb's 
disgust  at  the  rational  mode  of  educating  children.  While  he 
gave  utterance  to  a  deep  and  hearted  feeling  of  jealousy  for 
the  old  delightful  books  of  fancy  which  were  banished  by  the 
sense  of  Mrs.  Barbauld,  he  cherished  great  respect  for  that 
lady's  power  as  a  true  English  prose  writer;  and  spoke  often 
of  her  "  Essay  on  Inconsistent  Expectations"  as  alike  bold 
and  original  in  thought  and  elegant  in  style. 


118  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 


TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 


'♦  I  read  daily  your  political  essays.  I  was  particularly 
pleased  with  '  Once  a  Jacobin  :'  though  the  argument  is  ob- 
vious enough,  the  style  was  less  swelling  than  your  things 
sometimes  are,  and  it  was  plausible  ad  populum.     A  vessel 

has  just  arrived  from  Jamaica  with  the  news  of  poor 's 

death.  He  died  at  Jamaica  of  the  yellow  fever.  His  course 
was  rapid,  and  he  had  been  very  foolish,  but  I  believe  there 
was  more  of  kindness  and  warmth  in  him  than  in  almost  any 
other  of  our  schoolfellows.  The  annual  meeting  of  the  Blues 
is  to-morrow,  at  the  London  Tavern,  where  poor  Sammy  dined 
with  them  two  years  ago,  and  attracted  the  notice  of  all  by 
the  singular  foppishness  of  his  dress.  When  men  go  off  the 
stage  so  early,  it  scarce  seems  a  noticeable  thing  in  their  epi- 
taphs whether  they  have  been  wise  or  silly  in  their  lifetime. 

"  I  am  glad  the  snuff  and  Pi-pos's*  books  please.  '  Goody 
Two  Shoes'  is  almost  out  of  print.  Mrs.  Barbauld's  stuff  has 
banished  all  the  old  classics  of  the  nursery  ;  and  the  shopman 
at  Newbery's  hardly  deigned  to  reach  them  off  an  old  exploded 
corner  of  a  shelf  when  Mary  asked  for  them.  Mrs.  B.'s  and 
Mrs.  Trimmer's  nonsense  lay  in  piles  about.  Knowledge  in- 
significant and  vapid  as  Mrs.  B.'s  books  convey,  it  seems,  must 
come  to  a  child  in  the  shape  of  knowledge,  and  his  empty  nod- 
dle must  be  turned  with  conceit  of  his  own  powers  when  he 
has  learned  that  a  horse  is  an  animal,  and  Billy  is  better  than 
a  horse,  and  such  like  :  instead  of  that  beautiful  interest  in 
wild  tales  which  made  the  child  a  man,  while  all  the  time  he 
suspected  himself  to  be  no  bigger  than  a  child.  Science  has 
succeeded  to  poetry  no  less  in  the  little  walks  of  children  than 
with  men.  Is  there  no  possibility  of  averting  this  sore  evil  ? 
Think  of  what  you  would  have  been  now,  if,  instead  of  being 
fed  with  tales  and  old  wives'  fables  in  childhood,  you  had  been 
crammed  with  geography  and  natural  history ! 

"  Hang  them  !  I  mean  the  cursed  reasoning  crew,  those 
blights  and  blasts  of  all  that  is  human  in  man  and  child. 

"  As  to  the  translations,  let  me  do  two  or  three  hundred 
lines,  and  then  do  you  try  the  nostrums  upon  Stuart  in  any 
way  you  please.  If  they  go  down,  I  will  bray  more.  In 
fact,  if  I  got  or  could  but  get  50/.  a  year  only,  in  addition  to 
what  I  have,  I  should  live  in  affluence. 

"  Have  you  anticipated  it,  or  could  not  you  give  a  parallel  of 
Bonaparte  with  Cromwell,  particularly  as  the  contrast  in  their 
deeds  zfCecting  foreign  states  ?  Cromwell's  interference  for  tho 

*  A  nickname  of  endearment  for  little  Hartley  Coleridge. 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  119 

Albigenses,  B.'s  against  the  Swiss.  Then  religion  would 
come  in  ;  and  Milton  and  you  could  rant  about  our  countrymen 
of  that  period.  This  is  a  hasty  suggestion,  and  the  more 
hasty  because  I  want  my  supper.  I  have  just  finished  Chap- 
man's Homer.  Did  you  ever  read  it  ?  It  has  most  the  con- 
tinuous power  of  interesting  you  all  along,  like  a  rapid  original, 
of  any  ;  and,  in  the  uncommon  excellence  of  the  more  finished 
parts,  goes  beyond  Fairfax  or  any  of  'em,  The  metre  is  four- 
teen syllables,  and  capable  of  all  sweetness  and  grandeur. 
Cowper's  ponderous  blank  verse  detains  you  every  step  with 
some  heavy  Miltonism  ;  Chapman  gallops  off  with  you  his 
own  free  pace.  Take  a  simile  for  example.  The  council 
breaks  up — 

'  Being  abroad,  the  earth  was  overlaid 
With  flockers  to  them,  that  came  forth  ;  as  when  of  frequent  bees 
Swarms  rise  out  of  a  hollow  rock,  repairing  the  degrees 
Of  their  egression  endlessly,  with  ever  rising  neio 
From  forth  their  sweet  nest ;  as  their  store,  still  as  it  faded,  grew. 
And  never  would  cease  sending  forth  her  clusters  to  the  spring, 
They  still  crowd  out  so  ;  this  flock  here,  that  there,  belabouring 
The  loaded  flowers.     So,'  &c.,  &c. 

"  What  endless  egression  of  phrases  the  dog  commands  ! 

"  Take  another,  Agamemnon  wounded,  bearing  his  wound 
heroically  for  the  sake  of  the  army  (look  below)  to  a  woman 
in  labour. 

*  He,  with  his  lance,  sword,  mighty  stones,  pour'd  his  heroic  wreak 
On  other  squadrons  of  the  foe,  whiles  yet  warm  blood  did  break 
Through  his  cleft  veins  :  but  when  the  wound  was  quite  exhaust  and  crude. 
The  eager  anguish  did  approve  his  princely  fortitude. 
As  when  most  sharp  and  bitter  pangs  distract  a  labouring  dame, 
Which  the  divine  Ilithiae,  that  rule  the  painful  frame 
Of  human  childbirth,  pour  on  her;  the  llithisj  that  are 
The  daughters  of  Saturnia;  with  whose  extreme  repair 
The  woman  in  her  travail  strives  to  take  the  worst  it  gives ; 
With  thought,  it  must  be,  ^tis  love's  fruit,  the  end  for  which  she  lives  ; 
The  mean  to  make  herself  ne^v  bom,  what  comforts  will  redound  : 
So,'  &.C. 

"  I  will  tell  you  more  about  Chapman  and  his  peculiarities 
in  my  next.     1  am  much  interested  in  him. 

"  Yours,  ever  aflfectionately,  and  Pi-pos's, 

"  C.  L." 

The  following  fragment  of  a  letter  about  this  time  to  Cole- 
ridge refers  to  an  ofler  of  ('oleridge  to  supply  Lamb  with  lit- 
eral translations  from  the  German,  which  he  might  versify  for 
the  "  Morning  Post,"  for  the  increase  of  Lamb's  slender  in- 
come. 

TO    MR.    COLKRIDGE. 

*'  Dear  Coleridge — Your  offer  about  the  German  poems  is 
exceedingly  kind  ;  but  I  do  not  think  it  a  wise  speculation, 


120  LETTERS   TO   COLERIDGE. 

because  the  time  it  would  take  you  to  put  them  into  prose 
would  be  nearly  as  great  as  if  you  versified  them.  Indeed  I 
am  sure  you  could  do  the  one  nearly  as  soon  as  the  other ;  so 
that,  instead  of  a  division  of  labour,  it  would  be  only  a  multi- 
plication. But  1  will  think  of  your  offer  in  another  light.  I 
dare  say  I  could  find  many  things  of  a  light  nature  to  suit  that 
paper,  which  you  would  not  object  to  pass  upon  Stuart  as  your 
own,  and  I  should  come  in  for  some  light  profits,  and  Stuart 
think  the  more  highly  of  your  assiduity.  '  Bishop  Hall's 
Characters'  I  know  nothing  about,  having  never  seen  them. 
But  I  will  reconsider  your  offer,  which  is  very  plausible  ;  for 
as  to  the  drudgery  of  going  every  day  to  an  editor  with  my 
scraps,  like  a  pedler,  for  him  to  pick  out  and  tumble  about  my 
ribands  and  posies,  and  to  wait  in  his  lobby,  Slc,  no  money 
could  make  up  for  the  degradation.  You  are  in  too  high  re- 
quest with  him  to  have  anything  unpleasant  of  that  sort  to 
submit  to. 


[The  letter  refers  to  several  articles  and  books  which  Lamb 
promised  to  send  to  Coleridge,  and  proceeds :] 

"  You  must  write  me  word  whether  the  cap  and  Miltons 
are  worth  paying  carriage  for.  You  have  a  Milton ;  but  it  is 
pleasanter  to  eat  one's  own  peas  out  of  one's  own  garden,  than 
to  buy  them  by  the  peck  at  Covent  Garden  ;  and  a  book  reads 
the  better  which  is  our  own,  and  has  been  so  long  known  to 
us,  that  we  know  the  topography  of  its  blots,  and  dogs-ears, 
and  can  trace  the  dirt  in  it  to  having  read  it  at  tea  with  buttered 
muffins,  or  over  a  pipe,  which  I  think  is  the  maximum.  But, 
Coleridge,  you  must  accept  these  little  things,  and  not  think 
of  returning  money  for  them,  for  I  do  not  set  up  for  a  factor  or 
general  agent.  As  for  fantastic  debts  of  151.,  I'll  think  you 
were  dreaming,  and  not  trouble  myself  seriously  to  attend  to 
you.  My  bad  Latin  you  properly  correct ;  but  natales  for 
nates  was  an  inadvertency :  I  knew  better.  Progrediri,  or 
progredi^  I  thought  indifferent,  my  authority  being  Ainsworth. 
However,  as  I  have  got  a  fit  of  Latin,  you  will  now  and  then 
indulge  me  with  an  epistola.  I  pay  the  postage  of  this,  and 
propose  doing  it  by  turns.  In  that  case  I  can  now  and  then 
write  to  you  without  remorse  ;  not  that  you  would  mind  the 
money,  but  you  have  not  always  ready  cash  to  answer  small 
demands,  the  epistolarii  jiummi. 

"  Your  'Epigram  on  the  Sun  and  Moon  in  Germany'  is  ad- 
mirable. Take  'em  all  together,  they  are  as  good  as  Harring- 
ton's.    I  will  muster  up  all  the  conceits  I  can,  and  you  shall 


J.ETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  121 

have  a  packet  some  clay.  You  and  I  together  can  answer  all 
demands,  surely  :  you,  mounted  on  a  terrible  charger  (like 
Homer,  in  the  Battle  of  the  Books),  at  the  head  of  the  cav- 
alry :  I  will  lead  the  light  horse.  I  have  just  heard  from 
Stoddart.  Allen  and  he  intend  taking  Keswick  in  their  way 
home.  Allen  wished  particularly  to  have  it  a  secret  that  he 
is  in  Scotland,  and  wrote  to  me  accordingly  very  urgently. 
As  luck  was,  I  had  told  not  above  three  or  four;  but  Mary 

hi.d  told  Mrs.  G ,  of  Christ's  Hospital ! 

"  For  the  present,  farewell :  never  forgetting  love  to  Pipos 
and  his  friend.s. 

"C.  Lamb." 

TO    MK.    COLERIDGF. 

"  Wednesday  night. 

"  Observe,  there  comes  to  you,  by  the  Kendal  wagon  to- 
morrow, the  illustrious  4th  of  November,  a  box,  containing 
the  Miltons,  the  strange  American  Bible,  with  White's  brief 
note,  to  wliich  you  will  attend ; '  Baxter's  Holy  Commonwealth,' 
for  which  you  stand  indebted  to  me  3s.  6d.  ;  an  odd  volume 
of  Montaigne,  being  of  no  use  to  me,  I  having  the  whole  ;  cer- 
tain books  belonging  to  Wordsworth,  as  do  also  the  strange 
thick-hoofed  shoes,  which  are  very  much  admired  at  in  Lon- 
don. All  these  sundries  I  commend  to  your  most  strenuous 
looking  after.  If  you  find  the  Miltons  in  certain  parts  dirtied 
and  soiled  with  a  crumb  of  right  Gloucester  blacked  in  the 
candle  (my  usual  supper),  or,  pcradventure,  a  stray  ash  of 
tobacco  wafted  into  the  crevices,  look  to  that  passage  more 
especially  :  depend  upon  it,  it  contains  good  matter.  I  have 
got  your  little  Milton,  which,  as  it  contains  '  Salmasius' — and 
I  make  a  rule  of  never  hearing  but  one  side  of  the  question 
(why  should  I  distract  myself?) — I  shall  return  to  you  when  I 
pick  up  the  Latina  opera.  The  first  Defence  is  the  greatest 
work  among  them,  because  it  is  uniformly  great,  and  such  as 
is  befitting  the  very  mouth  of  a  great  nation,  speaking  for 
itself.  But  the  second  Defence,  which  is  but  a  succession 
of  splendid  episodes,  slightly  tied  together,  has  one  passage 
which,  if  you  have  not  read,  I  conjure  you  to  lose  no  time,  but 
read  it ;  it  is  his  consolations  in  his  blindness,  which  had  been 
made  a  reproach  to  him.  It  begins  whimsically,  with  poeti- 
cal flourishes  about  Tiresias  and  other  blind  worthies  (which 
still  are  mainly  interesting  as  displaying  his  singular  mind,  and 
in  what  degree  poetry  entered  into  his  daily  soul,  not  by  fits 
and  impulses,  but  ingrained  and  innate),  but  the  concluding 
page,  i.  c,  of  this  passag^c  (not  the  Drfensis),  which  you  will 
easily  find,  divested  of  all  brags  and  flourishes,  gives  so  rational, 

Vol.  T— 11  F 


122  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

SO  true  an  enumeration  of  his  comforts,  so  human,  that  it  can- 
not be  read  without  the  deepest  interest.  Take  one  touch  of 
the  religious  part : — '  Et  sane  hand  uUima  Dei  cura  caeci  {we 
blind  folks,  I  understand  it ;  not  nos  for  ego)  sumus  ;  qui  nos, 
quominus  quicquam  aliud  prseter  ipsum  cernere  valemus,  eo 
clementius  atque  benignius  respicere  dignatur.  Yae  qui  illu- 
dit  nos,  vse  qui  laedit,  execratione  publica  devovendo ;  nos  ab 
injuriis  hominum  non  modo  incolumes,  sed  pene  sacros  divina 
lex  reddidit,  divinus  favor  ;  nee  tarn  oculorum  hehetudine  quam 
cmlestium  alarum  umbrd  has  nobis  fecisse  tenebras  videtur, 
factas  illustrare  rursus  interiore  ac  longe  praestabiliore  lumine 
baud  raro  solet.  Hue  refero,  quod  et  amici  officiosius  nunc 
etiam  quam  solebant,  colunt,  observant,  adsunt ;  quod  et  non- 
nulli  sunt,  quibuscum  Pyladeas  atque  Theseas  alternare  voces 
verorum  amicorum  liceat, 

'  Vade  gubernaculum  mei  pedis, 
Da  manum  ministro  amico. 
Da  coUo  manum  tuum,  ductor  viae  ero  tibi.' 

All  this,  and  much  more,  is  highly  pleasing  to  know.  But 
you  may  easily  find  it ;  and  I  don't  know  why  I  put  down  so 
many  words  about  it,  but  for  the  pleasure  of  writing  to  you, 
and  the  want  of  another  topic. 

"  Yours  ever, 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  To-morrow  I  expect  with  anxiety  S.  T.  C.'s  letter  to  Mr. 
Fox." 

The  year  1803  passed  without  any  event  to  disturb  the  dull 
current  of  Lamb's  toilsome  life.  He  wrote  nothing  this  year 
except  some  newspaper  squibs,  and  the  delightful  little  poem 
on  the  death  of  Hester  Savory.  This  he  sent  to  Manning  at 
Paris,  with  the  following  account  of  its  subject : — "  Dear 
Manning,  I  send  vou  some  verses  I  have  made  on  the  death 
of  a  young  Quaker  you  may  have  heard  me  speak  of  as  being 
in  love  with  for  some  years  while  I  lived  at  Pentonvilie,  though 
I  had  never  spoken  to  her  in  my  life.  She  died  about  a  month 
since.  If  you  have  interest  with  the  Abbe  de  Lille,  you  may 
get  'em  translated :  he  has  done  as  much  for  the  Georgics." 
The  verses  must  have  been  written  in  the  very  happiest  of 
Lamb's  serious  moods.  I  cannot  refrain  from  the  luxury  of 
quoting  the  conclusion,  though  many  readers  have  it  by  heart. 

"  My  sprightly  neighbour,  gone  before 
To  that  unknown  and  silent  shore  ! 
Shall  we  not  meet  as  heretofore, 

Some  summer  morning, 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  123 

When  from  thy  cheerful  eyes  a  ray 
Hath  struck  a  bliss  upon  the  day, 
A  bliss  that  could  not  go  away, 

A  sweet  forewarning  ?" 

The  following  letters  were  written  to  Manning,  at  Pans, 
while  still  haunted  with  the  idea  of  oriental  adventure. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  My  dear  Manning — The  general  scope  of  your  letter  af- 
forded no  indications  of  insanity,  but  some  particular  points 
raised  a  scruple.  For  God's  sake  don't  think  any  more  of 
*  Independent  Tartary.'  What  are  you  to  do  among  such 
Ethiopians  ?  Is  there  no  lineal  descendant  of  Prester  John  ? 
Is  the  chair  empty?  Is  the  sword  unswayed?  Depend  upon  it 
they'll  never  make  you  their  king  as  long  as  any  branch  of 
that  great  stock  is  remaining.  I  tremble  for  your  Christianity. 
Read  Sir  John  Mandeville's  travels  to  cure  you,  or  come  over 
to  England.  There  is  a  Tartar  man  now  exhibiting  at  Exeter 
Change.  Come  and  talk  with  him,  and  hear  what  he  says 
first.  Indeed,  he  is  no  very  favourable  specimen  of  his  coun- 
trymen !  But,  perhaps,  the  best  thing  you  can  do  is  to  try  to 
get  the  idea  out  of  your  head.  For  this  purpose  repeat  to 
yourself  every  night,  after  you  have  said  your  prayers,  the 
words  Independent  Tartary,  Independent  Tartary,  two  or  three 
times,  and  associate  with  them  the  idea  of  oblivion  ('tis  Hart- 
ley's method  with  obstinate  memories),  or  say,  Independent, 
Independent,  have  I  not  already  got  an  independence  ?  That 
was  a  clever  way  of  the  old  Puritans,  pun-divinity.  My  dear 
friend,  think  what  a  sad  pity  it  would  be  to  bury  such  parts 
in  heathen  countries,  among  nasty,  unconversable,  horse-belch- 
ing, Tartar  people  !  Some  say  they  are  Cannibals  ;  and  then, 
conceive  a  Tartar-fellow  eating  my  friend,  and  adding  the  cool 
malignity  of  mustard  and  vinegar  !  I  am  afraid  'tis  the  read- 
ing of  Chaucer  has  misled  you  ;  his  foolish  stories  about  Cam- 
buscan,  and  the  ring,  and  the  horse  of  brass.  Believe  me, 
there  are  no  such  things,  'tis  all  the  poet's  invention  ;  but  if 
there  was  such  darling  things  as  old  Chaucer  sings,  I  would 
up  behind  you  on  the  horse  of  brass,  and  frisk  off  for  Prester 
John's  country.  But  these  all  are  tales  ;  a  horse  of  brass 
never  flew,  and  a  king's  daughter  never  talked  with  birds  ! 
The  Tartars,  really,  are  a  cold,  insipid,  smouchey  set.  You'll 
be  sadly  moped  (if  you  are  not  eaten)  among  ihoin.  Pray 
try  and  cure  yourself  Take  hellebore  (the  counsel  is  Hor- 
ace's, 'twas  none  of  my  thought  originally).  Shave  yourself 
oftener.  Eat  no  saffron,  for  saffron-eaters  contract  a  terrible 
Tartar-like  yellow.     Prav  to  avoid  the   fiend.     Eat  nothing 

'     F? 


124  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

that  gives  the  heartburn.  Shave  the  upper  lip.  Go  about  like 
a  European.  Read  no  books  of  voyages  (they  are  nothing 
but  lies),  only  now  and  then  a  romance,  to  keep  the  fancy 
under.  Above  all,  don't  go  to  any  sights  of  ty^/c?  iea.yi*.  That 
has  been  your  ruin.  Accustom  yourself  to  write  familiar  let- 
ters, on  common  subjects,  to  your  friends  in  England,  such  as 
are  of  a  moderate  understanding.  And  think  about  common 
things  more.  I  supped  last  night  with  Rickman,  and  met  a 
merry  natural  captain,  who  pleases  himself  vastly  with  once 
having  made  a  pun  at  Otaheite  in  the  O.  language.*  'Tis  the 
same  man  who  said  Shakspeare  he  liked,  because  he  was  so 
much  of  the  gentleman.  Rickman  is  a  man  '  absolute  in  all 
numbers.'  1  think  I  may  one  day  bring  you  acquainted,  if  you 
do  not  go  to  Tarlary  first ;  for  you'll  never  come  back.  Have 
a  care,  my  dear  friend,  of  Anthropophagi  !  their  stomachs  are 
always  craving.  'Tis  terrible  to  be  weighed  out  at  fivepence 
a  pound.  To  sit  at  table  (the  reverse  of  fishes  in  Holland), 
not  as  a  guest,  but  as  a  meat. 

"  God  bless  you  :  do  come  to  England.  Air  and  exercise 
may  do  great  things.  Talk  with  some  minister.  Why  not 
your  father  ? 

"  God  dispose  all  for  the  best.     I  have  discharged  my  duty. 

"  Your  sincere  friend, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"  19th  February,  1803,  London." 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  1803. 

"  Not  a  sentence,  not  a  syllable  of  Trismegistus,  shall  be 
lost  through  my  neglect,  i  am  his  word-banker,  his  store- 
keeper of  puns  and  syllogisms.  You  cannot  conceive  (and, 
if  Trismegistus  cannot,  no  man  can)  the  strange  joy  which  I 
felt  at  the  receipt  of  a  letter  from  Paris.  It  seemed  to  give 
me  a  learned  importance,  which  placed  me  above  all  who  had 
not  Parisian  correspondents.  Believe  that  I  shall  carefully 
husband  every  scrap,  which  will  save  you  the  trouble  of 
memory,  when  you  come  back.  You  cannot  write  things  so 
trifling,  let  them  only  be  about  Paris,  which  I  shall  not  treas- 
ure. In  particular,  I  must  have  parallels  of  actors  and  ac- 
tresses. I  must  be  told  if  any  building  in  Paris  is  at  all  com- 
parable to  Saint  Paul's,  which,  contrary  to  the  usual  mode  of 
that  part  of  our  nature  called  admiration,  I  have  looked  up  to 
with  unfading  wonder  every  morning  at  ten  o'clock,  ever  since 

*  Captain,  afterward  Admiral  Buvney,  who  became  one  of  the  most  con- 
stant  attendants  on  Lamb's  parlies,  and  whose  son,  Martin,  grew  up  in  his 
strongest  regard,  and  received  the  honour  of  the  dedication  of  the  second  vol- 
ume of  his  works 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  125 

it  has  lain  in  my  way  to  business.     At  noon  I  casually  glance 
upon  it,  being  hungry  ;  and  hunger  has  not  much  taste  for  the 
fine  arts.     Is  any  niglit-walk  comparable  to  a  walk  from  St. 
Paul's  to  Charing  Cross,  for  lighting,  and  paving,  crowds  going 
and  coming  without  respite,  the  rattle  of  coaches,  and  the 
cheerfulness  of  shops  ?    Have  you  seen  a  man  guillotined  yet  ? 
Is  it  as  good  as  hanging  ?    Are  the  women  all  painted,  and  the 
men  all  monkeys  ?  or  are  there  not  a  few  that  look  like  ra- 
tional of  both   sexes  ?    Are   you   and  the  first  consul  thick  ? 
All  this  expense  of  ink  I  may  fairly  put  you  to,  as  your  letters 
will  not  be  solely  for  my  proper  pleasure  ;  but  are  to  serve  as 
memoranda  and  notices,  helps  for  short  memory,  a  kind  of 
Rumfordizing  recollection  for  yourself  on  your  return.     Your 
letter  was  just  what  a  letter  should  be,   crammed,  and  very 
funny.     Every  part  of  it  pleased  me  till  you  came  to  Paris,  and 
your  philosophical  indolence  or  indifference  stung  me.     You 
cannot  stir  from  your   rooms  till   you   know  the  language  ! 
What  the  devil !    are  men  nothing  but  word-trumpets  ?    Are 
men  all  tongue  and  ear?    Have  these  creatures,  that  you  and  I 
profess  to  know  something  about,  no  faces,  gestures,  gabble, 
no  folly,  no  absurdity,  no  induction  of  French  education  upon 
the  abstract  idea  of  men  and  women,  no  similitude  or  dis- 
similitude to  English  1    Why,  thou  cursed  Smellfungus  !  your 
account  of  your  landing  and  reception,  and  Bullen  (I  forget 
how  you  spell  it,  it  was  spelt  my  way  in  Harry  the  Eighth's 
time)  was  exactly  in  that  minute  style  which  strong  impres- 
sions INSPIRE  (writing  to  a  Frenchman,  I  write  as  a  French- 
man would).     It  appears  to  mc  as  if  I  should  die  with  joy  at 
the  first  landing  in  a  foreign  country.     It  is  the  nearest  pleas- 
ure which  a  grown  man  can  substitute  for  that  unknown  one 
which  he  can  never  know,  the  pleasure  of  the  first  entrance 
into  life  from  the  womb.     I  dare  say,  in  a  short  time,  my  hab- 
its would  come  back  like  a  '  stronger  man'  armed,  and  drive 
out  that  new  pleasure  ;  and  I  should  soon  sicken  from  known 
objects.     Nothing  has  transpired  here  that  seems  to  me  of 
sufficient  importance  to  send  dry-sliod  over  the  water;    but  I 
suppose  you  will  want  to  be  told  some  news.     The  best  and 
the  worst  to  me  is,  that  I  have  given  up  two  guineas  a  week 
at  the  'Post,'  and  regained  my  health  and  spirits,  which  were 
upon  the  wane.     I  grew  sick,  and  Stuart  unsatisfied.     Ludisti 
satisj  tempus  ahire  est :  I  must  cut  closer,  that's  all.    Mister  Fell, 
or,  as  you,  with  your  usual  facetiousness  and  drollery,  call  him, 
Mr.  F-j-ll  has  stopped  short  in  the  middle  of  his  play.     Some 
friend  has  told  him  that  it  has  not  the  least  merit  in  it.     Oh  ! 
that  I  had  the  rectifying  of  the  Litany  !   I  would  put  in  a  libera 
nos  {Scriptores   videlicet)  ab  amicis  !     That's  all  the   news. 

ir 


126  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

A  propos  (is  it  pedantry,  writing  to  a  Frenchman,  to  express 
myself  sometimes  by  a  French  word,  when  an  Enghsh  one 
would  not  do  as  well?  methinks  my  thoughts  fall  naturally 

into  it) 

****** 

"My  dear  Manning — Although  something  of  the  latest,  and 
after  two  months'  waiting,  your  letter  was  highly  gratifying. 
Some  parts  want  a  little  explication  ;  for  example,  '  the  god- 
like face  of  the  first  consul.'  What  god  does  he  most  rese-m- 
ble.  Mars,  Bacchus,  or  Apollo  ?  or  the  god  Serapis,  who,  flying 
(as  Egyptian  chronicles  deliver)  from  the  fury  of  the  dog 
Anubis  (the  hieroglyph  of  an  English  mastiff),  lighted  upon 
Monomotapa  (or  the  land  of  apes),  by  some  thought  to  be 
Old  France,  and  there  set  up  a  tyranny,  &c.  Our  London 
prints  of  him  represent  him  gloomy  and  sulky,  like  an  angry 
Jupiter.  I  hear  that  he  is  very  small,  even  less  than  me.  I 
envy  you  your  access  to  this  great  man,  much  more  than  your 
seances  and  conversaziones,  which  1  have  a  shrewd  suspicion 
must  be  something  dull.  What  you  assert  concerning  the  ac- 
tors of  Paris,  that  they  exceed  our  comedians,  bad  as  ours  are, 
is  impossible.  In  one  sense  it  may  be  true,  that  their  fine 
gentlemen,  in  what  is  called  genteel  comedy,  may  possibly 
be  more  brisk  and  degage  than  Mr.  Caulfield  or  Mr.  Whitfield, 
but  have  any  of  them  the  power  to  move  laughter  in  excess  ? 
or  can  a  Frenchman  laugh  ?  Can  they  batter  at  your  judicious 
ribs  till  they  shake,  nothing  loath  to  be  so  shaken  ?  This  is 
John  Bull's  criterion,  and  it  shall  be  mine.  You  are  Frenchi- 
fied. Both  your  taste  and  morals  are  corrupt  and  perverted. 
By-and-by  you  will  come  to  assert  that  Bonaparte  is  as  great 
a  general  as  the  old  Duke  of  Cumberland,  and  deny  that  one 
Englishman  can  beat  three  Frenchmen.  Read  Henry  the 
Fifth  to  restore  your  orthodoxy.  All  things  continue  at  a  stay- 
still  in  London.  I  cannot  repay  your  new  novelties  with  my 
stale  reminiscences.  Like  the  prodigal,  I  have  spent  my 
patrimony,  and  feed  upon  the  superannuated  chaff*  and  dry 
husks  of  repentance  ;  yet  sometimes  I  remember  with  pleas- 
ure the  hounds  and  horses  which  I  kept  in  the  days  of  my 
prodigality.  I  find  nothing  new,  nor  any  thing  that  has  so 
much  of  the  gloss  and  dazzle  of  novelty  as  may  rebound  in 
narrative,  and  cast  a  reflective  glimmer  across  the  channel. 
Did  I  send  you  an  epitaph  1  scribbled  upon  a  poor  girl  who 
died  at  nineteen  ;  a  good  girl,  and  a  pretty  girl,  and  a  clever 
girl,  but  strangely  neglected  by  all  her  friends  and  kin  ? 

'  Under  this  cold  marble  stone 
Sleep  the  sad  remains  of  one 
Who,  when  alive,  by  few  or  none 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  127 

Was  loved,  as  loved  she  might  have  been, 

If  she  prosperous  days  had  seen, 

Or  had  thriving  been,  I  ween. 

Only  this  cold  funeral  stone 

Tells  she  was  beloved  by  one, 

Who  on  the  marble  graves  his  moan.' 

"I  send  you  this,  being  the  only  piece  of  poetry  I  have 
done  since  the  muses  all  went  with  T.  M.  to  Paris.  I  have 
neither  stuff  in  my  brain  nor  paper  in  my  drawer  to  write 
you  a  longer  letter.  Liquor,  and  company,  and  wicked  tobacco, 
a'  nights,  have  quite  dispericraniated  me,  as  one  may  say; 
but  you,  who  spiritualize  upon  Champagne,  may  continue  to 
write  long  long  letters,  and  stuff  'em  with  amusement  to  the 
end.  Too  long  they  cannot  be,  any  more  than  a  codicil  to  a 
will  which  leaves  me  sundry  parks  and  manors  not  specified 
in  the  deed.  But  don't  be  tivo  months  before  you  write  again. 
These  from  merry  old  England,  on  the  day  of  her  valiant 
patron  St.  George. 

"  C.  Lamb." 


CHAPTER  Vm. 

[1804  to  1806.] 

Letters  to  Manning,  Wordsworth,  Rickman,  and  Hazlitt.— •'  Mr.  H."  wrttten 
— accepted— damned. 

There  is  no  vestige  of  Lamb's  correspondence  in  the  year 
1804,  nor  does  he  seem  to  have  written  for  the  press.  This 
year,  however,  added  to  his  list  of  friends — one  in  whose 
conversation  he  took  great  delight,  until  death  severed  them — 
William  Hazlitt.  This  remarkable  metaphysician  and  critic 
had  then  just  completed  his  first  work,  the  "Essay  on  the 
Principles  of  Human  Action,"  but  had  not  entirely  given  up 
his  hope  of  excelling  as  a  painter.  After  a  professional  tour 
through  part  of  England,  during  which  he  satisfied  his  sitters 
better  than  himself,  he  remained  some  time  at  the  house  of 
his  brother,  then  practising  as  a  portrait  painter  with  consid- 
erable success  ;  and  while  endeavouring  to  procure  a  publisher 
for  his  work,  painted  a  portrait  of  Lamb.  It  is  one  of  the  last 
of  Hazlitt's  efforts  in  an  art  which  he  afterward  illustrated  with 
the  most  exquisite  criticism  which  the  knowledge  and  love  of 
it  could  inspire. 

Among  the  vestiges  of  the  early  part  of  1805  are  the  three 
following  letters  to  Manning      If  the  hero  of  the  next  letter. 


128  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

Mr.  Richard  Hopkins,  is  living,  I  trust  he  will  not  repine  at 
being  ranked  with  those  who 

"  Do  good  by  stealth,  and  blush  to  find  it  fame." 

TO    MR.   MANNING. 

"  16  Mitre  Court  Buildings, 

"  Saturday,  24th  Feb.,  1805. 

'  Dear  Manning — I  have  been  very  unwell  since  I  saw  you. 
A  sad  depression  of  spirits,  a  most  unaccountable  nervous- 
ness, from  which  I  have  been  partially  relieved  by  an  odd 
accident.  You  knew  Dick  Hopkins,  the  scullion  of  Caius  ? 
This  fellow,  by  industry  and  agility,  has  thrust  himself  into 
the  important  situations  (no  sinecures,  believe  me)  of  cook  to 
Trinity  Hall  and  Caius  College  :  and  the  generous  creature 
has  contrived,  with  the  greatest  delicacy  imaginable,  to  send 
me  a  present  of  Cambridge  brawn.  What  makes  it  the  more 
extraordinary  is,  that  the  man  never  saw  me  in  his  life  that  I 
know  of.  I  suppose  he  has  heard  of  me.  I  did  not  immedi- 
ately recognise  the  donor  ;  but  one  of  Richard's  cards,  which 
had  accidentally  fallen  into  the  straw,  detected  him  in  a  mo- 
ment. Dick,  you  know,  was  always  remarkable  for  flourish- 
ing. His  card  imports,  that  '  orders  (to  wit,  for  brawn)  from 
any  part  of  England,  Scotland,  or  Ireland,  will  be  duly  exe- 
cuted,' &c.  At  first  I  thought  of  declining  the  present ;  but 
Richard  knew  my  blind  side  when  he  pitched  upon  brawn. 
'Tis,  of  all  my  hobbies,  the  supreme  in  the  eating  way.  He 
might  have  sent  sops  from  the  pan,  skimmings,  crumpets, 
chips,  hog's  lard,  the  tender  brown  judiciously  scalped  froi» 
a  fillet  of  veal  (dexterously  replaced  by  a  salamander),  the  top? 
of  asparagus,  fugitive  livers,  runaway  gizzards  of  fowls,  the 
eyes  of  martyred  pigs,  tender  efiusions  of  laxative  woodcocks 
the  red  spawn  of  lobsters,  leveret's  ears,  and  such  pretty  filch 
ings  common  to  cooks ;  but  these  had  been  ordinary  pres- 
ents, the  everyday  courtesies  of  dish-washers  to  their  sweet- 
hearts. Brawn  was  a  noble  thought.  It  is  not  every  com- 
mon gullet-fancier  that  can  properly  esteem  of  it.  It  is  like  ^ 
picture  of  one  of  the  old  Italian  masters.  Its  gusto  is  of  that 
hidden  sort.  As  Wordsworth  sings  of  a  modest  poet,  •  you 
must  love  him,  ere  to  you  he  will  seem  worthy  of  your  love  ;' 
so  brawn  you  must  taste  it  ere  to  you  it  will  have  any  taste 
at  all.  But  'tis  nuts  to  the  adept :  those  that  will  send  out 
their  tongues  and  feelers  to  find  it  out.  It  will  be  wooed  and, 
not  unsought,  be  won.  Now,  ham-essence,  lobsters,  turtle, 
such  popular  minions,  absolutely  court  you,  lay  themselves  out 
to  strike  you  at  first  smack,  like  one  of  David's  pictures  (they 
call   him  Darveed),  compared  with  the  plain   russet-coated 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  129 

wealth  of  a  Titian  or  a  Corregio,  as  I  illustrated  above.  Such 
are  the  obvious  glaring  heathen  virtues  of  a  corporation  din- 
ner, compared  with  the  reserved  collegiate  worth  of  a  brawn. 
Do  me  the  favour  to  leave  off  the  business  which  you  may  be 
at  present  upon,  and  go  immediately  to  the  kitchens  of  Trinity 
and  Caius,  and  make  my  most  respectful  compliments  to  Mr. 
Richard  Hopkins,  and  assure  him  that  his  brawn  is  most  excel- 
lent ;  and  that  I  am,  moreover,  obliged  to  him  for  his  iimuendo 
about  salt  water  and  bran,  which  1  shall  not  fail  to  improve. 
I  leave  it  to  you  whether  you  shall  choose  to  pay  him  the 
civility  of  asking  him  to  dinner  while  you  stay  in  Cambridge, 
or  in  whatever  other  way  you  may  best  like  to  show  your 
gratitude  io  my  friend.  Richard  Hopkins,  considered  in  many 
points  of  view,  is  a  very  extraordinary  character.  Adieu  ;  I 
hope  to  see  you  to  supper  in  London  soon,  where  we  will  taste 
Richard's  brawn,  and  drink  his  health  in  a  cheerful  but  mod- 
erate cup.  We  have  not  many  such  men  in  any  rank  of  life  as 
Mr.  R.  Hopkins.  Crisp,  the  barber  of  St.  Mary's,  was  just 
such  another.  I  wonder  he  never  sent  me  any  little  token, 
some  chestnuts,  or  a  puff,  or  two  pounds  of  hair,  just  to  re- 
member him  by.  Gifts  are  like  nails.  Pra^sens  ut  absens ; 
that  is,  your  present  makes  amends  for  your  absence. 

"  Yours,  C.  Lamb  " 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Dear  Manning — I  sent  to  Brown's  immediately.  Mr 
Brown  (or  Pijou,  as  he  is  called  by  the  moderns)  denied  the 
having  received  a  letter  from  you.  The  one  for  you  he 
remembered  receiving,  and  remitting  to  Leadenhall-street ; 
whither  I  immediately  posted  (it  being  the  middle  of  dinner), 
my  teeth  unpicked.  There  I  learned,  that  if  you  want  a  letter 
set  right,  you  must  apply  at  the  first  door  on  the  left  hand 
before  one  o'clock.  I  returned  and  picked  my  teeth.  And 
this  morning  I  made  my  application  in  form,  and  have  seen 
the  vagabond  letter,  which  most  likely  accompanies  this.  If 
it  does  not,  I  will  get  Rickman  to  name  it  to  the  speaker,  who 
will  not  fail  to  lay  the  matter  before  parliament  the  next  ses- 
sions, when  you  may  be  sure  to  have  all  abuses  in  the  post 
department  rectified. 

"N.B.  There  seems  to  be  some  informality  epidemical. 
You  direct  yours  to  me  in  Mitrc-court;  my  true  address  is 
Mitre-court  Buildings.  By  the  pleasantries  of  Fortune,  who 
likf's  a  joke  or  a  double  entendre  as  well  as  the  best  of  us  her 
children,  there  happens  to  be  another  Mr.  Lamb  (that  there 
should  be  two!  !)  in  Mitre-court. 

*'  Farewell,  and  think  upon  it.  C.  L. 

"  Saturday." 

F  3 


130  LETTER    TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH. 


TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Dear  Manning — Certainly  you  could  not  have  called  at 
all  hours  from  two  till  ten,  for  we  have  been  only  out  of  an 
evening  Monday  and  Tuesday  in  this  week.  But,  if  you  think 
you  have,  your  thought  shall  go  for  the  deed.  We  did  pray 
for  you  on  Wednesday  night.  Oysters  unusually  luscious ; 
pearls  of  extraordinary  magnitude  found  in  them.  I  have 
made  bracelets  of  them  ;  given  them  in  clusters  to  ladies. 
Last  night  we  went  out  in  despite,  because  you  were  not  come 
at  your  hour. 

"  This  night  we  shall  be  at  home,  so  shall  we  certainly 
both  Sunday.  Monday,  'J'uesday,  and  Wednesday.  Take  your 
choice ;  mind,  I  don't  say  of  one  ;  but  choose  which  evening 
you  will  not,  and  come  the  other  four.  Doors  open  at  five 
o'clock.  Shells  forced  about  nine.  Every  gentleman  smokes 
or  not,  as  he  pleases. 

"  C.  L." 

Durmg  the  last  five  years,  tobacco  had  been  at  once  Lamb's 
solace  and  his  bane.  In  the  hope  of  resisting  the  temptation 
of  late  conviviality  to  which  it  ministered,  he  formed  a  reso- 
lution, the  virtue  of  which  can  be  but  dimly  guessed,  to  aban- 
don its  use  ;  and  imbodied  the  floating  fancies  which  had  at- 
tended on  his  long  wavering  in  one  of  the  richest  of  his  poems, 
"  The  Farewell  to  Tobacco."  After  many  struggles  he  di- 
vorced himself  from  his  genial  enemy ;  and  though  he  after- 
ward renewed  acquaintance  with  milder  dalliance,  he  ulti- 
mately abandoned  it,  and  was  guiltless  of  a  pipe  in  his  latter 
years.  The  following  letter,  addressed  while  his  sister  was 
laid  up  with  severe  and  protracted  illness,  will  show  his  feel- 
ings at  this  time.  Its  affecting  self-upbraidings  refer  to  no 
greater  failings  than  the  social  indulgences  against  which  he 
was  manfully  struggling. 

TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH. 

"  Friday,  14th  June,  1805. 
"My  dear  Miss  Wordsworth — I  try  to  think  Mary  is  recov- 
ering, but  I  cannot  always  feel  it ;  and,  meanwhile,  she  is  lost 
to  me,  and  I  miss  a  prop.  All  my  strength  is  gone,  and  I  am 
like  a  fool  bereft  of  her  co-operation.  I  dare  not  think,  lest 
I  should  think  wrong;  so  used  am  I  to  look  up  to  her  in  the 
least  and  the  biggest  perplexity.  'J'o  say  all  that  I  find  her 
would  be  more  than  I  think  anybody  could  possibly  under- 
stand ;  and  when  I  hope  to  have  her  well  again  soon,  it  would 
be  sinning  against  her  feelings  to  go  about  to  praise  her,  for 


LETTER    TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH.  131 

I  can  conceal  nothing  that  I  do  from  her.  She  is  older,  and 
wiser,  and  better  than  me,  and  all  my  wretched  imperfections 
I  cover  to  myself  by  resolutely  thinking  on  her  goodness. 
She  would  share  life  and  death  with  me.  She  lives  but  for 
me.  And  I  know  I  have  been  wasting  and  teazing  her  life 
for  five  years  past  incessantly  with  my  ways  of  going  on. 
But  even  in  this  upbraiding  of  myself  I  am  offending  against 
her,  for  I  know  that  she  has  cleaved  to  me  for  better  for 
worse  ;  and,  if  the  balance  has  been  against  her  hitherto,  it 
was  a  noble  trade.  I  am  stupid,  and  lose  myself  in  what  I 
write.  I  write  rather  what  answers  to  my  feelings  (which 
are  sometimes  sharp  enough)  than  express  my  present  ones, 
for  1  am  only  flat  and  stupid. 

"  I  cannot  resist  transcribing  three  or  four  lines  which  poor 
Mary  made  upon  a  picture  (a  Holy  Family)  which  we  saw  at 
an  auction  only  one  week  before  she  was  taken  ill.  They 
are  sweet  lines  and  upon  a  sweet  picture.  But  I  send  them 
only  as  the  latest  memorial  of  her. 

'virgin   and    child,    L.    da    VINCI. 

'  Maternal  lady  with  thy  virgin-grace, 
Heaven-born,  thy  Jesus  seemeth  sure. 
And  thou  a  virgin  pure. 
Lady  most  perfect,  when  thy  angel  face 
Men  look  upon,  they  wish  to  be 
A  Catholic,  Madona  fair,  to  worship  thee. 

'*  You  had  her  lines  about  the  '  Lady  Blanch.'     You  have 
not  had  some  which  she  wrote  upon  a  copy  of  a  girl  from  Ti 
tian,  which  I  had  hung  up  where  that  print  of  Blanch  and  the 
Abbess  (as  she  beautifully  interpreted  two  female  figures  from 
L.  da  Vinci)  had  hung  in  our  room.     'Tis  light  and  pretty 

'  Who  art  thou,  fair  one,  who  usurp'st  the  place 
Of  Blanch,  the  lady  of  the  matchless  grace  ? 
Come,  fair  and  pretty,  tell  to  me 
Who  in  thy  lifetime  ihou  mightst  be  ^ 
Thou  pretty  art  ant!  fair, 

But  with  the  Lady  Blanch  thou  never  must  compare. 
No  need  for  Blanch  her  history  to  tell. 
Whoever  saw  her  face  they  there  did  read  it  well ; 
But  when  I  look  on  thee,  1  only  know 
There  lived  a  pretty  maid  some  hundred  years  ago.' 

"  This  is  a  little  unfair,  to  tell  so  much  about  ourselves,  and 
to  advert  so  little  to  your  letter,  so  full  of  comfortable  tidings 
of  you  all.  But  my  own  cares  press  pretty  close  upon  me, 
and  you  can  make  allowance.  That  you  may  go  on  gathering 
strength  and  peace  is  the  next  wish  to  Mary's  recovery. 

"  I  had  almost  forgot  vour  repeated  invitation.     Supposing 


132  LtiTTEll    TO    HAZLll'T. 

that  Mary  will  be  well  and  able,  there  is  another  ability  which 
you  may  guess  at,  which  I  cannot  promise  myself.  In  pru- 
dence we  ought  not  to  come.  This  illness  will  make  it  still 
more  prudential  to  wait.  It  is  not  a  balance  of  this  way  of 
spending  our  money  against  another  way,  but  an  absolute 
question  of  whether  we  shall  stop  now,  or  go  on  wasting 
away  the  little  we  have  got  beforehand.  My  best  love,  how- 
ever, to  you  all ;  and  to  that  most  friendly  creature,  Mrs. 
Clarkson,  and  better  health  to  her  when  you  see  or  write  to 
her. 

"  Charles  Lamb." 

The  "  Farewell  to  Tobacco"  was  shortly  after  transmitted 
to  Mr.  and  Miss  Wordsworth  with  the  following: — 

TO    MR.   AND    MISS   WORDSWORTH. 

"  I  wish  you  may  think  this  a  handsome  farewell  to  my 
*  Friendly  Traitress.'  Tobacco  has  been  my  evening  comfort 
and  my  morning  curse  for  these  five  years ;  and  you  know 
how  difficult  it  is  from  refraining  to  pick  one's  lips  even  when 
it  has  become  a  habit.  This  poem  is  the  only  one  which  I 
have  finished  since  so  long  as  when  I  wrote  '  Hester  Savory.' 
I  have  had  it  in  my  head  to  do  it  these  two  years,  but  tobacco 
stood  in  its  own  light  when  it  gave  me  headaches  that  pre- 
vented my  singing  its  praises.  Now  you  have  got  it,  you 
have  got  all  my  store,  for  I  have  absolutely  not  another  line. 
No  more  has  Mary.  We  have  nobody  about  us  that  cares 
for  poetry,  and  who  will  rear  grapes  when  he  shall  be  the 
sole  eater  ?  Perhaps  if  you  encourage  us  to  show  you  what 
we  may  write,  we  may  do  something  now  and  then  before  we 
absolutely  forget  the  quantity  of  an  English  line  for  want  of 
practice.  The  '  Tobacco'  being  a  little  in  the  way  of  With- 
ers (whom  Southey  so  much  likes),  perhaps  you  will  some- 
how convey  it  to  him  with  my  kind  remembrances.  Then 
everybody  will  have  seen  it  that  I  wish  to  see  it,  I  having  sent 
it  to  xMalta. 

"  I  remain,  dear  W.  and  D.,  yours  truly, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"28th  September,  1805." 

The  following  letter  to  Hazlitt  bears  date  18th  Nov.,  1805. 

TO    MR.    HAZLITT. 

"  Dear  Hazlitt — I  was  very  glad  to  hear  from  you,  and  that 
your  journey  was  so  picturesque.  We  miss  you,  as  we  fore- 
told we  should.  One  or  two  thmgs  have  happened  which 
are   beneath    the    dignity   of  epistolary  communication,  but 


LETTERS    TO    HAZLITT.  133 

which,  seated  about  our  fireside  at  night  (the  winter  hands  of 
pork  have  begun),  gesture  and  emphasis  might  have  talked 

into  some    importance.      Something    about  's  wife  ;  for 

instance,  how  tall  she  is,  and  that  she  visits  pranked  up  like 
a  Queen  of  the  May,  with  green  streamers  :  a  good-natured 
woman  though,  which  is  as  much  as  you  can  expect  from  a 
friend's  wife,  whom  you  got  acquainted  with  a  bachelor. 
Some  things,  too,  about  Monkey,*  which  can't  so  well  be  writ- 
ten :  how  it  set  up  for  a  fine  lady,  and  thought  it  had  got 
lovers,  and  was  obliged  to  be  convinced  of  its  age  from  the 
parish  register,  where  it  was  proved  to  be  only  twelve  ;  and 
an  edict  issued  that  it  should  not  give  itself  airs  yet  these 
four  years;  and  how  it  got  leave  to  be  called  Miss,  by  grace: 
these,  and  such  like  hows,  were  in  my  head  to  tell  you,  but 
who  can  write  ?  Also,  how  Manning  is  come  to  town  in 
spectacles,  and  studies  physic ;  is  melancholy,  and  seems  to 
have  something  in  his  head  which  he  don't  impart.  Then, 
how  I  am  going  to  leave  off  smoking.  Oh  la  !  your  Leonar- 
dos of  Oxford  made  my  mouth  water.  I  was  hurried  through 
the  gallery,  and  they  escaped  me.  What  do  I  say  ?  1  was 
a  Goth  then,  and  should  not  have  noticed  them.  I  had  not 
settled  my  notions  of  beauty  ;  I  have  now  for  ever  I  the  small 
head,  the  long  eye — that  sort  of  peering  curve — the  wicked 
Italian  mischief;  the  stick-at-nothing,  Herodias'  daughter-kind 
of  grace.  You  understand  me  ?  But  you  disappoint  me  m 
passing  over  in  absolute  silence  the  Blenheim  Leonardo. 
Didn't  you  see  it?     Excuse  a  lover's  curiosity.     I  have  seen 

no  pictures  of  note  since  except  at  Mr.  D 's  gallery.     It 

is  curious  to  see  how  differently  two  great  men  treat  the  same 
subject,  yet  both  excellent  in  their  way.     For  instance,  Milton 

and  Mr.  D .     Mr.  D has  chosen  to  illustrate    the 

story  of  Samson  exactly  in  the  point  of  view  in  which  Milton 
has  been  most  happy  :  the  interview  with  the  Jewish  hero, 
blind  and  captive,  and  Delilah.  Milton  has  imagined  his 
locks  grown  again,  strong  as  horsehair  or  porcupine's  bris- 
tles ;  doubtless,  shaggy  and  black,  as  being  hairs  '  which,  of 
a  nation  armed,  coiitamed  the  strength.'  1  don't  remember 
he  says  black  ;  but  could  Milton  imagine  them  to  be  yellow  ? 

Do  you  ?     Mr.  D ,  with  striking  originality  of  conception, 

has  crowned  him  with  a  thin  yellow  wig,  in  colour  precisely 

like  Dyson's;  in  curl  and  quantity  resembling  Mrs.  P -'s; 

his  limbs  rather  stout — about  such  a  man  as  my  brother  or 
Rickman — but  no  Atlas  nor  Hercules,  nor  yet  so  long  as  Du- 
bois, the  clown  of  Sadler's  Wells.     This  was  judicious,  ta- 

*   The  daughtpf  of  a  friend,  whom  Lamb  exceed mgly  liked  from  a  child, 
and  always  called  by  this  epithet. 
12 


134  LETTERS    TO    HAZLITT. 

king  the  spirit,  of  the  story  rather  than  the  fact ;  for,  doubtless, 
God  could  communicate  national  salvation  to  the  trust  of  flax 
and  tow  as  well  as  hemp  and  cordage,  and  could  draw  down 
a  temple  with  a  golden  tress  as  soon  as  with  all  the  cables  of 

the  British  navy. 

****** 

"  Wasn't  you  sorry  for  Lord  Nelson  1  I  have  followed  him 
in  fancy  ever  since  I  saw  him  walking  in  Pall-Mall  (I  was 
prejudiced  against  him  before),  looking  just  as  a  hero  should 
look ;  and  I  have  been  very  much  cut  about  it  indeed.  He 
was  the  only  pretence  of  a  great  man  we  had.  Nobody  is 
left  of  any  name  at  all.  His  secretary  died  by  his  side.  I 
imagined  him,  a  Mr.  Scott,  to  be  the  man  you  met  at  Hume's; 
but  I  learn  from  Mrs.  Hume  that  it  is  not  the  same.  I  met 
Mrs.  H.  one  day,  and  agreed  to  go  on  the  Sunday  to  tea,  but 
the  rain  prevented  us  and  the  distance.  I  have  been  to  apolo- 
gize, and  we  are  to  dine  there  the  first  fine  Sunday  !  Strange 
perverseness.  I  never  went  while  you  stayed  here,  and  now 
I  go  to  Jind  you.  What  other  news  is  there,  Mary  ?  What 
puns  have  I  made  in  the  last  fortnight?  You  never  remem- 
ber them.  You  have  no  relish  of  the  comic.  '  Oh  !  tell  Haz- 
litt  not  to  forget  to  send  me  the  American  Farmer.  I  dare 
say  it  is  not  so  good  as  he  fancies  ;  but  a  book's  a  book.'  I 
have  not  heard  from  Wordsworth  or  from  Malta  since. 
Charles  Kemble,  it  seems,  enters  into  possession  to-morrow. 
We  sup  at  109  Russell-street  this  evening.  I  wish  your 
friend  would  not  drink.  It's  a  blemish  in  the  greatest  char- 
acters. You  send  me  a  modern  quotation  poetical.  How  do 
you  like  this  in  an  old  play  ?  Vittoria  Corombona,  a  spunky 
Italian  lady,  a  Leonardo  one,  nicknamed  the  White  Devil, 
being  on  her  trial  for  murder,  &:c.,  and  questioned  about  se- 
ducing a  duke  from  his  wife  and  the  state,  makes  answer  : — 

'  Condemn  you  me  for  that  the  duke  did  love  me  ? 
So  may  you  blame  some  fair  and  crystal  river, 
For  that  some  melancholic  distracted  man 
Hath  drown'd  himself  in  it.' 

"  N.B.  I  shall  expect  a  line  from  you,  if  but  a  bare  line, 
whenever  you  write  to  Russell-street,  and  a  letter  often  when 
you  do  not.  I  pay  no  postage.  But  I  will  have  consideration 
for  you  until  parliament  time  and  franks.  Luck  to  Ned 
Search  and  the  new  art  of  colouring.  Monkey  sends  her 
love,  and  Mary  specially. 

"  Yours  truly, 

«C.  Lamb." 


LETTERS    TO    IlAZLITT.  135 

Lamb  introduced  Hazlitt  to  Godwin;  and  we  find  him  early 
in  the  following  year  thus  writing  respecting  the  offer  of  Haz- 
litt's  work  to  Johnson,  and  his  literary  pursuits. 

TO    MR.    HAZLITT. 

"Thursday,  loth  Jan.,  1806. 

'*  Dear  Hazlitt — Godwin  went  to  Johnson's  yesterday  about 
your  business.  Johnson  would  not  come  down,  or  give  any 
answer,  but  has  promised  to  open  the  manuscript,  and  to  give 
you  an  answer  in  one  month.  Godwin  will  punctually  go 
again  (Wednesday  is  Johnson's  open  day)  yesterday  four 
weeks  next :  i.  e.,  in  one  lunar  month  from  this  lime.  Till 
when,  Johnson  positively  declines  giving  any  answer.  I  wish 
you  joy  on  ending  your  Search.  Mrs.  H.  was  naming  some- 
thing about  a  '  Life  of  Fawcett,'  to  be  by  you  undertaken  :  the 
great  Fawcett,  as  she  explained  to  Manning  when  he  asked 
*  what  Fawcett  V  He  innocently  thought  Fawcett  the  player. 
But  Fawcett  the  divine  is  known  to  many  people,  albeit  un- 
known to  the  Chinese  inquirer.  I  should  think,  if  you  liked 
it,  and  Johnson  declined  it,  Phillips  is  the  man.  He  is  per- 
petually bringing  out  biographies,  Richardson,  Wilks,  Foot, 
Lee  Lewis,  without  number  :  little  trim  things  in  two  easy 
volumes,  price  12.?.  the  two,  made  up  of  letters  to  and  from, 
scraps,  posthumous  trifles,  anecdotes,  and  about  forty  pages 
of  hard  biography ;  you  might  dish  up  a  Fawcettiad  in  three 
months,  and  ask  60/.  or  80/.  for  it.  1  dare  say  that  Phillips 
would  catch  at  it.  I  wrote  you  the  other  day  in  a  great  hurry. 
Did  you  get  it?  This  is  merely  a  letter  of  business  at  God- 
win's request.  Lord  Nelson  is  quiet  at  last.  His  ghost  only 
keeps  a  slight  fluttering  in  odes  and  elegies  in  newspapers, 
and  impromptus,  which  could  not  be  got  ready  before  the  fu- 
neral. 

"As  for  news, is  coming  to  town  on  Monday  (if  no 

kind  angel  intervene)  to  surrender  himself  to  prison.  He 
hopes  to  get  the  rules  of  the  Fleet.  On  the  same  or  nearly 
the  same  day,  F ,  my  other  quondam  co-friend  and  drink- 
er, will  go  to  Newgate,  and  his  wife  and  four  children,  I  sup- 
pose, to  the  parish.  Plenty  of  reflection  and  motives  of  grat- 
itude to  the  wise  Disposer  of  all  things  in  us,  whose  prudent 
conduct  has  hitherto  ensured  us  a  warm  fire  and  snug  roof 
over  our  heads.  Nullum  numen  ahest  si  sit  Prudent la.  Alas  ! 
Prudentia  is  in  the  last  quarter  of  her  tutelary  shining  over 
me,  A  little  time  and  I  —  but  maybe  I  may,  at  last,  hit 
upon  some  mode  of  collecting  some  of  the  vast  superfluities 
of  this  money-voiding  town.  Much  is  to  be  got,  and  I  do  not 
want  much.     All  1  ask  is  time  and  leisure  ;  and  I  am  cruelly 


136  LETTERS    TO    HAZLITT. 

ofT  for  them.  When  you  have  the  inclination  I  shall  be  very 
glad  to  have  a  letter  from  you.  Your  brother  and  Mrs.  H.,  I 
am  afraid,  think  hardly  of  us  for  not  coming  oftener  to  see 
them,  but  we  are  distracted  beyond  what  they  can  conceive 
with  visiters  and  visitings.  I  never  have  an  hour  for  my  head 
to  work  quietly  its  own  workings  ;  which,  you  know,  is  as  ne- 
cessary to  the  human  system  as  sleep.  Sleep,  too,  I  can't 
get  for  these  winds  of  a  night :  and  without  sleep  and  rest 
what  should  ensue  ? 

*'  Yours,  dear  H., 

"  C.  Lamb." 

TO    MR.    HAZLITT. 

"  Dear  H. — Godwin  has  just  been  here  in  his  way  from 
Johnson's.  Johnson  has  had  a  fire  in  his  house  ;  this  hap- 
pened about  five  weeks  ago  ;  it  was  in  the  daytime,  so  it  did 
not  burn  the  house  down,  but  it  did  so  much  damage  that  the 
house  must  come  down  to  be  repaired.  His  nephew  that  we 
met  on  Hampstead  Hill  put  it  out.  Well,  this  fire  has  put 
him  so  back,  that  he  craves  one  more  month  before  he  gives 
you  an  answer.  I  will  certainly  goad  Godwin  (if  necessary) 
to  go  again  this  very  day  four  weeks ;  but  I  am  confident  he 
will  want  no  goading.  Three  or  four  most  capital  auctions 
of  pictures  advertised  ;  in  May,  Wellhore  Ellis  Agar\\  the  first 
private  collection  in  England,  so  Holcroft  says.  In  March, 
Sir  George  Young's,  in  Stratford-place  (where  Cosway  lives), 
and  a  Mr.  Hulse's  at  Blackheath,  both  very  capital  collections, 
and  have  been  announced  for  some  months.  Also  the  Marquis 
of  Lansdown's  pictures  in  March ;  and,  though  inferior  to 
mention,  lastly,  the  Dulwich  Gallery.  Don't  your  mouth  wa- 
ter to  be  here  ?  T'other  night  Loftus  called,  whom  we  have 
not  seen  since  you  went  before.  We  meditate  a  stroll  next 
Wednesday,  fast  day.  He  happened  to  light  upon  Mr.  Hol- 
croft, wife,  and  daughter,  their  first  visit  at  our  house.  Your 
brother  called  last  night.  We  keep  up  our  intimacy.  He  is 
going  to  begin  a  large  Madona  and  child  from  Mrs.  H.  and 
baby.  I  fear  he  goes  astray  after  ignes  fatui.  He  is  a  clever 
man.  By-the-by,  I  saw  a  miniature  of  his  as  far  excelling  any 
in  his  show  cupboard  (that  of  your  sister  not  excepted)  as  that 
show  cupboard  excels  the  show  things  you  see  in  windows, 
an  old  woman — hang  her  name — but  most  superlative  ;  he 
has  it  to  clean — I'll  ask  him  the  name — but  the  best  miniature 
I  ever  saw.  But  for  oil  pictures  ! — what  has  he  to  do  with  Ma- 
donas  1 — if  the  Virgin  Mary  were  alive  and  visitable,  he  would 
not  hazard  himself  in  a  Covent-Garden-pit-crowd  to  see  her. 
It  an't  his  style  of  beauty,  is  it  ?     But  he  will  go  on  painting 


"air.  h.  137 

things  he  ought  not  to  paint,  and  not  painting  things  he  ought 
to  paint.  Manning  not  gone  to  China,  but  talks  of  going  this 
spring.  God  forbid.  Coleridge  not  heard  of.  I  am  going  to 
leave  off  smoke.  In  the  mean  time,  I  am  so  smoky  with  last 
night's  ten  pipes,  that  I  must  leave  off.  Mary  begs  her  kind 
remembrances.  Pray  write  to  us.  This  is  no  letter,  but  I 
supposed  you  grew  anxious  about  Johnson. 

"  N.B.  Have  taken  a  room  at  three  shillings  a  week,  to  be 
in  between  five  and  eight  at  night,  to  avoid  my  nocturnal  alias 
knock-eternal  visiters.  The  first  fruits  of  my  retirement  has 
been  a  farce  which  to  manager  to-morrow.  Wish  my  ticket 
luck.     God  bless  you,  and  do  write. 

"  YoMxs,  fumosissimus J 

"C.  Lamb. 

"  Wednesday,  19th  Feb.,  1806." 

The  farce  referred  to  in  the  foregoing  letter  is  the  delight- 
ful jeu-d' esprit^  "  Mr.  H.,"  destined  to  only  one  night's  stage 
existence,  but  to  become  "  a  good  jest  for  ever."  It  must  be 
confessed  that  it  has  not  substance  enough  for  a  dramatic 
piece  in  two  acts  ;  a  piece  which  must  present  a  show  of  real 
interest,  involve  its  pair  of  young  lovers  in  actual  perplexities, 
and  terminate  in  the  seriousness  of  marriajje  !  It  would  bo 
rare  sport  in  Milton's  "  Limbo  of  Vanity,"  but  is  too  airy  for 
the  ponderous  sentimentalism  of  the  modern  school  of  farce. 
As  Swift,  in  "  Gulliver,"  brings  everything  to  the  standard  of 
size,  so  in  this  farce  everything  is  reduced  to  an  alphabetical 
standard.  Humour  is  sent  to  school  to  learn  its  letters  ;  or, 
rather,  letters  are  made  instinct  with  the  most  delicate  humour. 
It  is  the  apotheosis  of  the  alphabet,  and  teaches  the  value  of 
a  good  name  without  the  least  hint  of  moral  purposes.  This 
mere  pleasantry ;  this  refining  on  sounds  and  letters  ;  this 
verbal  banter,  and  watery  collision  of  the  pale  reflexions  of 
words,  could  not  succeed  on  a  stage  which  had  begun  to  re- 
quire interest,  moral  or  immoral,  to  be  interwoven  with  the 
web  of  all  its  actions  ;  which  no  longer  rejoiced  in  the  riot 
of  animal  spirits  and  careless  gaycty  ;  which  no  longer  porinit- 
ted  wit  to  take  the  sting  from  evil,  as  well  as  the  load  from 
care  ;  but  infected  even  its  prince  of  rakes,  Charles  Surface, 
with  a  cant  of  sentiment  which  makes  us  turn  for  relief  to  the 
more  honest  hypocrite  his  brother.  Mr.  H.  "  could  never  do ;" 
but  its  composition  was  pleasant,  and  its  acceptance  gave 
liamb  some  of  the  happiest  moments  he  ever  spent.  Thus 
he  announces  it  to  Wordsworth,  in  reply  to  a  letter  communi- 
cating to  him  that  the  poet  was  a  father. 
12» 


138  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 


TO    MR.    "WORDSWORTH. 


*•  Dear  Wordsworth — We  are  pleased,   you  may  be  sure, 

with  the  good  news   of  Mrs.  W .     Hope  all  is  well  over 

by  this  time.  *  A  fine  boy  ! — have  you  any  more  ? — one  more 
and  a  girl — poor  copies  of  me  !'  vide  Mr.  H.,  a  farce  which 
the  proprietors  have  done  me  the  honour;  but  I  will  set  down 
Mr.  Wroughton's  own  words.  N.  B.  The  ensuing  letter  Ajkas 
sent  in  answer  to  one  which  I  wrote,  begging  to  know  if  my 
piece  had  any  chance,  as  I  might  make  alterations,  &c.  I, 
writing  on  the  Monday,  there  comes  this  letter  on  the  Wednes- 
day.    Attend  ! 

[Copy  of  a  Letter  from  Mr.  R.  Wroughton.] 

*  Sir — Your  piece  of  Mr.  H.,  I  am  desired  to  say,  is  ac- 
cepted at  Drury  Lane  Theatre  by  the  proprietors,  and,  if 
agreeable  to  you,  will  be  brought  forward  when  the  proper  op- 
portunity serves.  The  piece  shall  be  sent  to  you  for  your  al- 
terations in  the  course  of  a  few  days,  as  the  same  is  not  in 
my  hands,  but  with  the  proprietors. 

*  I  am,  sir,  your  obedient  servant, 

*  Richard  Wroughton. 
[Dated] 
*  66  Gower-street, 

'  Wednesday,  June  11,  1806.' 

"  On  the  following  Sunday  Mr.  T.  comes.  The  scent  of  a 
manager's  letter  brought  him.  He  would  have  gone  farther 
any  day  on  such  a  business.  I  read  the  letter  to  him.  He 
deems  it  authentic  and  peremptory.  Our  conversation  natu- 
rally fell  upon  pieces,  different  sorts  of  pieces ;  what  is  the 
best  way  of  offering  a  piece,  how  far  the  caprice  of  managers 
is  an  obstacle  in  the  way  of  a  piece,  how  to  judge  of  the  mer- 
its of  a  piece,  how  long  a  piece  may  remain  in  the  hands  of 
the  managers  before  it  is  acted  ;  and  my  piece,  and  your  piece, 
and  my  poor  brother's  piece — my  poor  brother  was  all  his  life 
endeavouring  to  get  a  piece  accepted. 

"  I  wrote  that  in  mere  wantonness  of  triumph.  Have  no- 
thing more  to  say  about  it.  The  managers,  I  thank  my  stars, 
have  decided  its  merits  for  ever.  They  are  the  best  judges  of 
pieces,  and  it  would  be  insensible  in  me  to  affect  a  false  mod- 
esty after  the  very  flattering  letter  which  I  have  received. 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 


139 


X 
X 
X 
X 
X 
X 


A  D  M I T 


y 


X 

:< 
X 


BOXES. 

Mr.  H. 

Ninth    Night. 


Charles  Lamb,     a 


"  I  think  this  will  be  as  good  a  pattern  for  orders  as  I  can 
think  on.  A  little  thin  flowery  border,  round,  neat,  not  gaudy, 
and  the  Drury  Lane  Apollo,  with  the  harp  at  the  top.  Or  shall 
I  have  no  Apollo? — simply  nothing?     Or  perhaps  the  comic 


muse 


«p? 


'*  The  same  form,  only  I  think  without  the  Apollo,  will  serve 
for  the  pit  and  galleries.  I  think  it  will  be  best  to  write  my 
name  at  full  length  ;  but,  then,  if  I  give  away  a  great  many, 
that  will  be  tedious.     Perhaps  Ch.  Lamb  will  do. 

"  BOXES,  now  I  think  on  it,  I'll  have  in  capitals.  The 
rest  in   a  neat  Italian  hand.     Or  better,  perhaps,  33o)rfS  in 

old  English  characters,  like  Madoc  or  Thalaba  ? 

#*♦**♦ 

"  Apropos  of  Spenser  (you  will  find  him  mentioned  a  page 
or  two  before,  near  enough  for  an  apropos),  I  was  discoursing 
on  poetry  (as  one's  apt  to  deceive  one's  self,  and,  when  a  per- 
son is  willing  to  talk  of  what  one  likes,  to  believe  that  he  also 
likes  the  same,  as  lovers  do)  with  a  young  gentleman  of  my 
office,  who  is  deep  read  in  Anacreon  Moore,  f.ord  Strangford, 
and  the  principal  modern  poets,  and  I  happened  to  mention 
Epithalamiums,  and  that  I  could  show  him  a  very  fine  one  of 
Spenser's.  At  the  mention  of  this  my  gentleman,  who  is  a 
very  fine  gentleman,  pricked  up  his  ears,  and  expressed  great 
pleasure,  and  begtred  that  I  would  give  him  leave  to  copy  it: 
he  did  not  care  how  long  it  was  f^for  I  objected  the  length),  he 
should  he  very  happy  to  see  ariT/t/iing  by  him.  Then  pau.sing 
and  looking  sad,  he  ejaculated  '  poor  Spk>cer  !'  I  begged 
to  know  the  reason  of  this  ejaculation,  thinking  that  linu;  had 
by  this  time  softened  down  any  calamities  which  th(;  bard 
might  have  endured.  'Why,  poor  fellow  !'  said  he,  'he  has 
lost  his  wife!'  '  Lost  his  wife  !'  said  I,  '  who  are  you  talk- 
ing of  V  '  Why,  Spencer  !'  said  he  ;  *  I've  read  the  "  Monody" 
he  wrote  on  the  occasion,  and  a  very  prftty  thing  it  /.v.'  This 
led  to  an  explanation  (it  could  be  delayed  no  longer),  that  the 


140  LETTERS    TO    RICKMAN. 

■  sound  Spenser,  which,  when  poetry  is  talked  of,  generally 
excites  an  image  of  an  old  bard  in  a  ruff,  and  sometimes  with 
it  dim  notions  of  Sir  P.  Sidney,  and  perhaps  Lord  Burleigh, 
had  raised  in  my  gentleman  a  quite  contrary  image  of  the 
Honourable  William  Spencer,  who  has  translated  some  things 
from  the  German  very  prettily,  which  are  published  with  Lady 
Di.  Beauclerk's  designs.  Nothing  like  defining  of  terms  when 
we  talk.  What  blunders  might  I  have  fallen  into  of  quite  in- 
applicable criticism  but  for  this  timely  explanation. 

"  N.B.  At  the  beginning  of  Edm.  Spenser  (to  prevent  mis- 
takes), I  have  copied  from  my  own  copy,  and  primarily  from  a 
book  of  Chalmers's  on  Shakspeare,  a  sonnet  of  Spenser's  never 
printed  among  his  poems.  It  is  curious  as  being  manly  and 
rather  Miltonic,  and  as  a  sonnet  of  Spenser's  with  nothing  in 
it  about  love  or  knighthood.  I  have  no  room  for  remembran- 
ces ;  but  I  hope  our  doing  your  commission  will  prove  we  do 
not  quite  forget  you.  C.  L." 

The  interval  between  the  completion  of  the  farce  "  and  its 
first  acting,"  though  full  of  bright  hopes  of  dramatic  success, 
was  not  all  a  phantasm.  The  following  two  letters  to  Mr. 
Rickman,  now  one  of  the  Clerks  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
show  Lamb's  unwearied  kindness. 

TO    MR.    RICKMAN. 

"Dear  Rickman — You  do  not  happen  to  have  any  place  at 
your  disposal  which  would  suit  a  decayed  man  of  letters  ?  I 
do  not  much  expect  that  you  have,  or  that  you  will  go  much 
out  of  your  way  to  serve  the  object,  when  you  hear  it  is  F. 
But  the  case  is,  by  a  mistaking  of  his  turn^  as  they  call  it,  he 
is  reduced,  I  am  afraid,  to  extremities,  and  would  be  extremely 
glad  of  a  place  in  an  office.  Now,  it  does  sometimes  happen, 
that  just  as  a  man  wants  a  place,  a  place  wants  him  ;  and  though 
this  is  a  lottery  to  which  none  but  G.  B.  would  choose  to  trust 
his  all,  there  is  no  harm  just  to  call  in  at  Despair's  office  for  a 
friend,  and  see  if  his  number  is  come  up  (B.'s  further  case  I 
enclose  by  way  of  episode).  Now,  if  you  should  happen,  or 
anybody  you  know,  to  want  a  hand,  here  is  a  young  man  of 
solid  but  not  brilliant  genius,  who  would  turn  his  hand  to  the 
making  out  dockets,  penning  a  manifesto,  or  scoring  a  tally, 
not  the  worse  (I  hope)  for  knowing  Latin  and  Greek,  and 
having  in  youth  conversed  with  the  philosophers.  But  from 
these  follies  I  believe  he  is  thoroughly  awakened,  and  would 
bind  himself  by  a  terrible  oath  never  to  imagine  himself  an 
extraordinary  genius  again. 

"  Yours,  &c. 

"C.  Lamb." 


LETTERS    TO    RICKMAN.  141 


TO    MR.  RICKMAN. 


"  Dear  Rickman — I  send  you  some  papers  about  a  salt- 
water soap,  for  which  the  inventor  is  desirous  of  getting  a 
parliamentary  reward,  like  Dr.  Jenner.  Whether  such  a 
prospect  be  feasible,  I  mainly  doubt,  taking  for  granted  the 
equal  utility.  I  should  suppose  the  usual  way  of  paying  such 
projectors  is  by  way  of  patents  and  contracts.  The  patent, 
you  see,  he  has  got.  A  contract  he  is  about  with  the  navy 
board.  Meantime,  the  projector  is  hungry.  Will  you  an- 
swer me  two  questions,  and  return  them  with  the  papers  as 
soon  as  you  can?  Imprimis,  is  there  any  chance  of  success 
in  application  to  parliament  for  a  reward?  Did  you  ever 
hear  of  the  invention  ?  You  see  its  benefits  and  saving  to 
the  nation  (always  the  first  motive  with  a  true  projector) 
are  feelingly  set  forth  :  the  last  paragraph  but  one  of  the 
estimate,  in  enumerating  the  shifts  poor  seamen  are  put 
to,  even  approaches  the  pathetic.  But,  agreeing  to  all  he 
says,  is  there  the  remotest  chance  of  parliament  giving  the 
projector  anything ;  and  ivhen  should  application  be  made, 
now  or  after  a  report  (if  he  can  get  it)  from  the  navy  board  ? 
Secondly,  let  the  infeasibility  be  as  great  as  you  will,  you 
will  oblige  me  by  telling  me  the  way  of  introducing  such  an 
application  in  parliament,  without,  buying  over  a  majority  of 
members,  which  is  totally  out  of  projector's  power.  1  vouch 
nothing  for  the  soap  myself;  for  I  always  wash  in  fresh  water^ 
and  find  it  answer  tolerably  well  for  all  purposes  of  cleanli- 
ness ;  nor  do  I  know  the  projector ;  but  a  relation  of  mine 
has  put  me  on  writing  to  you,  for  whose  parliamentary  knowl- 
edge he  has  great  veneration. 

"  P.S.  The  Captain  and  Mrs.  Burney  and  Phillips  take 
their  chance  at  cribbage  here  on  Wednesday.  AVill  you  and 
Mrs.  R.  join  the  party  ?  Mary  desires  her  compliments  to 
Mrs.  R.,  and  joins  in  the  invitation. 

"  Yours  truly, 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  Monday." 

Before  the  production  of  "Mr.  H.,"  Lamb  was  obliged,  in 
sad  earnest,  to  part  from  Manning,  who,  after  talking  and  think- 
ing about  China  for  years,  took  the  heroic  rcsohiiion  of  going 
thither,  not  to  acquire  wealth  or  fame,  but  to  realize  the  phan- 
tom of  his  restless  thought.  Happy  was  he  to  have  a  friend 
like  Mr.  Burney,  to  indulge  and  soften  his  grief,  which  he 
thus  expresses  in  his  first  letter  to  his  friend. 


142  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 


TO    MR.    MANNING. 


**  My  dear  Manning — I  didn't  know  what  your  going  wa? 
till  I  shook  a  last  fist  with  you,  and  then  'twas  just  like  hav- 
ing shaken  hands  with  a  wretch  on  the  fatal  scaffold ;  and, 
when  you  are  down  the  ladder,  you  can  never  stretch  out  to 
him  again.  Mary  says  you  are  dead,  and  there's  nothing  to 
do  but  to  leave  it  to  time  to  do  for  us  in  the  end  what  it  al- 
ways does  for  those  who  mourn  for  people  in  such  a  case. 
But  she'll  see  by  your  letter  you  are  not  quite  dead.  A  little 
kicking  and  agony,  and  then — .  Martin  Burney  took  me  out 
a  walking  that  evening,  and  we  talked  of  Manning  ;  and  then 
I  came  home  and  smoked  for  you,  and  at  twelve  o'clock  came 
home  Mary  and  Monkey  Louisy  from  the  play,  and  there 
was  more  talk  and  more  smoking,  and  they  all  seemed  first- 
rate  characters,  because  they  knew  a  certain  person.  But 
what's  the  use  of  talking  about 'em  ?  By  the  time  you'll  have 
made  your  escape  from  the  Kalmuks,  you'll  have  stayed  so 
long  I  shall  never  be  able  to  bring  to  your  mind  who  Mary 
was,  who  will  have  died  about  a  year  before,  nor  who  the 
Holcrofts  were  !  Me  perhaps  you  will  mistake  for  Phillips,  or 
confound  me  with  Mr.  Dawe,  because  you  saw  us  together. 
Mary  (whom  you  seem  to  remember  yet)  is  not  quite  easy 
that  she  had  not  a  formal  parting  from  you.  I  wish  it  had  so 
happened.  But  you  must  bring  her  a  token,  a  shawl  or  some- 
thing, and  remember  a  sprightly  little  mandarin  for  our  man- 
telpiece, as  a  companion  to  the  child  I  am  going  to  purchase 
at  the  museum.  She  says  you  saw  her  writings  about  the 
other  day,  and  she  wishes  you  should  know  what  they  are. 
/She  is  doing  for  Godwin's  bookseller  twenty  of  Shakspeare's 
plays,  to  be  made  into  children's  tales.  Six  are  already  done 
by  her,  to  wit,  '  The  Tempest,'  '  Winter's  Tale,'  '  Midsummer 
Night,'  '  Much  Ado,'  '  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,'  and  '  Cym- 
beline  ;'  and  the  '  Merchant  of  Venice'  is  in  forwardness.  I 
have  done  '  Othello'  and  '  Macbeth,'  and  mean  to  do  all  the 
tragedies.  I  think  it  will  be  popular  among  the  little  people, 
besides  money.  It's  to  bring  in  sixty  guineas.  Mary  has 
done  them  capitally,  I  think  you'd  think.  These  are  the 
humble  amusements  we  propose  while  you  are  gone  to  plant 
the  cross  of  Christ  among  barbarous  pagan  anthropophagi. 
Quam  homo  homini  praestat  !  but  then,  perhaps,  you'll  get 
murdered,  and  we  shall  die  in  our  beds  with  a  fair  literary 
reputation.  Be  sure,  if  you  see  any  of  those  people  whose 
heads  do  grow  beneath  their  shoulders,  that  you  make  a 
draught  of  them.  It  will  be  very  curious.  Oh  !  Manning,  I 
am  serious  to  sinking,  almost,  when  I  think   that   all  those 


I 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  143 

evenings,  which  you  have  made  so  pleasant,  are  gone  perhaps 
for  ever.  Four  years  you  talk  of  may  be  ten,  and  you  may- 
come  back  and  find  such  alterations  !  Some  circumstances 
may  grow  up  to  you  or  to  me  that  may  be  a  bar  to  the  return 
of  any  such  intimacy.  I  dare  say  all  this  is  hum  !  and  that 
all  will  come  back ;  but,  indeed,  we  die  many  deaths  before 
we  die,  and  I  am  almost  sick  when  I  think  that  such  a  hold 
as  I  had  of  you  is  gone.  1  have  friends,  but  some  of  'em  are 
changed.  Marriage,  or  some  circumstance,  rises  up  to  make 
them  not  the  same.  But  I  felt  sure  of  you.  And  that  last 
token  you  gave  me  of  expressing  a  wish  to  have  my  name 
joined  with  yours,  you  know  not  how  it  affected  me  :  like  a 
legacy. 

"  God  bless  you  in  every  way  you  can  form  a  wish.  May 
he  give  you  health,  and  safety,  and  the  accomplishment  of  all 
your  objects,  and  return  you  again  to  us,  to  gladden  some  fire- 
side or  (tther  (I  suppose  we  shall  be  moved  from  the  Temple). 
I  will  nurse  the  remembrance  of  your  steadiness  and  quiet, 
which  used  to  infuse  something  like  itself  into  our  nervous, 
minds.  Mary  called  you  our  ventilator.  Farewell,  and  take 
her  best  wishes  and  mine. 

"  Good-by, 

"  C.  L." 

Christmas  approached,  and  Lamb  then  conveyed  to  Man 
ning,  now  at  the  antipodes,  news  of  poor  Holcroft's  failure  in 
his  play  of  "The  Vindictive  Man,"  and  his  own  approaching 
trial. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  5th  December,  1806. 
*'  Manning,  your  letter  dated  Hottentots,  August  the  what- 
was-it?  came  to  hand.  lean  scarce  hope  that  mine  will  have 
the  same  luck.  China — Canton — bless  us — how  it  strains  the 
imagination  and  makes  it  ache  !  I  write  under  another  uncer- 
tainty whether  it  can  go  to-morrow  by  a  ship  which  I  have  just 
learned  is  going  off  direct  to  your  part  of  the  world,  or  wheth- 
er the  despatches  may  not  be  sealed  up,  arul  tliis  have  to 
wait;  for,  if  it  is  detained  here,  it  will  grow  staler  in  a  fort- 
night than  in  a  five  months'  voyage  coining  to  you.  It  will  be 
a  point  of  conscience  to  send  you  none  but  bran  new  news  (the 
latest  edition),  which  will  but  grow  the  better,  like  oranges 
for  a  sea  voyage.  Oh  that  you  should  be  so  many  hemi- 
spheres off — if  I  speak  incorrectly  you  can  correct  me — why 
the  simplest  death  or  marriage  that  takes  place  here  must  be 
important  to  you  as  news  in  the  old  Bastille.     There's  your 


144  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

friend  Tuthill  has  got  away  from  France — you  remembei 
France  ?  and  Tuthill  ?  ten  to  one  but  he  writes  by  this  post, 
if  he  don't  get  my  note  in  time,  apprizing  him  of  the  vessel 
sailing.  Know,  then,  that  he  has  found  means  to  obtain  leave 
from  Bonaparte,  without  making  use  of  any  incredible  roman- 
tic pretences^  as  some  have  done  who  never  meant  to  fulfil 
them,  to  come  home,  and  I  have  seen  him  here  and  at  Hol- 
croft's.  An't  you  glad  about  Tuthill  ?  Now,  then,  be  sorry  for 
Holcroft,  whose  new  play,  called  '  The  Vindictive  Man,'  was 
damned  about  a  fortnight  since.  It  died  in  part  of  its  own  weak- 
ness, and  in  part  with  being  choked  up  with  bad  actors.  The 
two  principal  parts  were  destined  to  Mrs.  Jordan  and  Mr. 
Bannister,  but  Mrs.  J.  has  not  come  to  terms  with  the  mana- 
gers ;  they  have  had  some  squabble,  and  Bannister  shot  some 
of  his  fingers  off  by  thegoing  off  of  a  gun.  So  Miss  Duncan 
had  her  part,  and  Mr.  De  Camp  took  his.  His  part,  the  prin- 
cipal comic  hope  of  the  play,  was  most  unluckily  Goldfinch 
taken  out  of  the  'Road  to  Ruin,'  not  only  the  same  character, 
but  the  identical  Goldfinch — the  same  as  Falstaflf  is  in  two 
plays  of  Shakspeare — as  the  devil  of  ill-luck  would  have  it, 
half  the  audience  did  not  know  that  H.  had  written  it,  but 
were  displeased  at  his  stealing  from  the  '  Road  to  Ruin ;'  and 
those  who  might  have  borne  a  gentlemanly  coxcomb  with  his 
'  That's  your  sort,'  '  Go  it,'  such  as  Lewis  is,  did  not  relish 
the  intolerable  vulgarity  and  inanity  of  the  idea  stripped  of  his 
manner.  De  Camp  was  hooted  more  than  hissed,  hooted  and 
bellowed  off  the  stage  before  the  second  act  was  finished,  so 
that  the  remainder  of  his  part  was  forced  to  be,  with  some  vi- 
olence to  the  play,  omitted.  In  addition  to  this,  a  woman  of 
the  town  was  another  principal  character — a  most  unfortunate 
choice  in  this  moral  day.  The  audience  were  as  scandalized 
as  if  you  were  to  introduce  such  a  personage  to  their  private 
tea-tables.  Besides,  her  action  in  the  play  was  gross — 
wheedling  an  old  man  into  marriage.  But  the  mortal  blunder 
of  the  play  was  that  which,  oddly  enough,  H.  took  pride  in, 
and  exultingly  told  me  of  the  night  before  it  came  out,  that 
there  were  no  less  than  eleven  principal  characters  in  it,  and 
I  believe  he  meant  of  the  men  only,  for  the  playbill  expressed 
as  much,  not  reckoning  one  woman — and  true  it  was,  for  Mr. 
Powell,  Mr.  Raymond,  Mr.  Bartlett,  Mr.  H.  Siddons,  Mr.  Bar- 
rymore,  &c.,  &:c.,  to  the  number  of  eleven,  had  all  parts 
equally  prominent,  and  there  were  as  much  of  them  in  quan- 
tity and  rank  as  of  the  hero  and  heroine — and  most  of  them 
gentlemen  who  seldom  appear  but  as  the  hero's  friend  in  a 
farce,  for  a  minute  or  two,  and  here  they  all  had  their  ten 
minute  speeches,  and  one  of  them  gave  the  audience  a  serious 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  145 

account  how  he  was  now  a  lawyer,  but  had  been  a  poet,  and 
then  a  long  enumeration  of  the  inconveniences  of  authorship, 
rascally  booksellers,  reviewers,  &;c.,  which  first  set  the  au- 
dience a  gaping ;  but  I  have  said  enough.  You  will  be  so 
sorry,  that  you  will  not  think  the  best  of  me  for  my  detail ; 
but  news  is  news  at  Canton.  Poor  H.,  I  fear,  will  feel  the 
disappointment  very  seriously  in  a  pecuniary  light.  What  if 
he  should  be  obliged  to  part  with  his  long-necked  Guido  that 
hangs  opposite  as  you  enter,  and  the  game-piece  that  hangs 
in  the  back  drawing-room,  and  all  those  Vandycks,  &;c.  ? 
God  should  temper  the  wind  to  the  shorn  connoisseur.  I  hope 
I  need  not  say  to  you  that  I  feel  for  the  weather-beaten  author, 
and  for  all  his  household.  I  assure  you  his  fate  has  soured 
a  good  deal  the  pleasure  I  should  have  otherwise  taken  in  my 
own  little  farce  being  accepted,  and,  I  hope,  about  to  be  acted 
— it  is  in  rehearsal,  actually,  and  I  expect  it  to  come  out  next 
week.  It  is  kept  a  sort  of  secret,  and  the  rehearsals  have 
gone  on  privately,  lest,  by  many  folks  knowing  it,  the  story 
should  come  out,  which  would  infallibly  damn  it.  You  re- 
member I  had  it  sent  before  you  went.  Wroughton  read  it, 
and  was  much  pleased  with  it.  I  speedily  got  an  answer.  I 
took  it  to  make  alterations,  and  lazily  kept  it  some  months  ; 
then  took  courage,  and  furbished  it  up  in  a  day  or  two,  and 
took  it.  In  less  than  a  fortnight  I  heard  the  principal  part 
was  given  to  EUiston,  who  liked  it,  and  only  wanted  a  pro- 
logue, which  I  have  since  done  and  sent  it ;  and  I  had  a  note 
the  day  before  yesterday  from  the  manager,  Wroughton  (bless 
his  fat  face — he  is  not  a  bad  actor  in  some  things),  to  say  that 
I  should  be  summoned  to  the  rehearsal  after  the  next,  which 
next  was  to  be  yesterday.  I  had  no  idea  it  was  so  forward. 
I  have  had  no  trouble,  attended  no  reading  or  rehearsal,  made 
no  interest ;  what  a  contrast  to  the  usual  parade  of  authors  ! 
But  it  is  peculiar  to  modesty  to  do  all  things  without  noise  or 
pomp  !  I  have  some  suspicion  it  will  appear  in  public  on 
Wednesday  next ;  for  W.  says  in  his  note,  it  is  so  forward 
that,  if  wanted,  it  may  come  out  next  week,  and  a  new  melo- 
drame  is  announced  for  every  day  till  then  ;  and  a  '  new  farce 
is  in  rehearsal,'  is  put  up  in  the  bills.  Now  you'd  like  to 
know  the  subject.  The  title  is  '  Mr.  II.,'  no  more  ;  how  sim- 
ple, how  taking!  A  great  H  sprawling  over  the  playbill,  and 
attracting  eyes  at  every  corner.  The  story  is  a  coxcomb  ap- 
pearing at  Bath,  vastly  rich — all  the  ladies  dying  for  him — all 
bursting  to  know  who  he  is — but  he  goes  by  no  other  name 
than  Mr.  H.  ;  a  curiosity  like  that  of  the  dames  of  Strasburg 
about  the  man  with  the  great  nose.  But  I  won't  tell  you  any 
more  about  it.  Yes  I  will ;  but  I  can't  give  vou  an  idea  how 
Vol.  I— 13  G 


146  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

I  have  done  it.  I'll  just  tell  you  that,  after  much  vehement 
admiration,  when  his  true  name  comes  out,  '  Hogsflesh,'  all 
the  women  shun  him,  avoid  him,  and  not  one  can  be  found  to 
change  their  name  for  him — that's  the  idea — how  flat  it  is 
here — but  how  whimsical  in  the  farce  !  And  only  think  how 
hard  upon  me  it  is  that  the  ship  is  despatched  to-morrow,  and 
my  triumph  cannot  be  ascertained  till  the  Wednesday  after — 
but  all  China  will  ring  of  it  by-and-by.  N.B.  (But  this  is 
a  secret)  The  professor  has  got  a  tragedy  coming  out  with 
the  young  Roscius  in  it,  in  January  next,  as  we  say,  January 
last  it  will  be  with  you — and  though  it  is  a  profound  secret 
now,  as  all  his  affairs  are,  it  cannot  be  much  of  one  by  the  time 
you  read  this.  However,  don't  let  it  go  any  further.  I  un- 
derstand there  are  dramatic  exhibitions  in  China.  One  would 
not  like  to  be  forestalled.  Do  you  find  in  all  this  stuff  I  have 
written  anything  like  those  feelings  which  one  should  send  my 
old  adventuring  friend,  that  is  gone  to  wander  among  Tartars, 
and  may  never  come  again  ?  I  don't — but  your  going  away, 
and  all  about  you  is  a  threadbare  topic.  I  have  worn  it  out 
with  thinking — it  has  come  to  me  when  I  have  been  dull  with 
anything,  till  my  sadness  has  seemed  more  to  have  come  from 
it  than  to  have  introduced  it.  I  want  you,  you  don't  know  how 
much — but,  if  I  had  you  here  in  my  European  garret,  we 
should  talk  over  such  stuff  as  I  have  written — so — those 
'  Tales  from  Shakspeare'  are  coming  out,  and  Mary  has  begun 
a  new  work.  Mr.  Dawe  is  turned  author,  he  has  been  in  such 
a  way  lately — Dawe  the  painter,  I  mean — he  sits  and  stands 
about  at  Holcroft's,  and  says  nothing — then  sighs,  and  leans 
his  head  on  his  hand.  I  took  him  to  be  in  love — but  it  seems 
he  was  only  meditating  a  work — '  The  life  of  Morland,' 
the  young  man  is  not  used  to  composition.  Rickman  and 
Captain  Burney  are  well ;  they  assemble  at  my  house  pretty 
regularly  of  a  Wednesday — a  new  institution.  Like  other 
great  men,  I  have  a  public  day,  cribbage  and  pies,  with  Phil- 
lips and  noisy . 

"  Good  Heaven  !  what  a  bit  only  I've  got  left !  how  shall  I 
squeeze  all  I  know  into  this  morsel !  Coleridge  is  come 
home,  and  is  going  to  turn  lecturer  on  taste  at  the  Royal  In- 
stitution. I  shall  get  £200  from  the  theatre  if  Mr.  H.  has  a 
good  run,  and  I  hope  £100  for  the  copyright.  Nothing  if  it 
fails,  and  there  never  was  a  more  ticklish  thing.  The  whole 
depends  on  the  manner  in  which  the  name  is  brought  out, 
which  I  value  myself  on,  as  a  chef-d'oeuvre.  How  the  paper 
grows  less  and  less  !  In  less  than  two  minutes  I  shall  cease 
to  talk  to  you,  and  you  may  rave  to  the  great  Wall  of  China. 
N.B.    Is  there  such  a  wall?     Is  it  as   big  as  Old  London 


*'  MR.  H.  147 

Wall,  by  Bedlam  ?  Have  you  met  with  a  friend  of  mine, 
named  Ball,  at  Canton  ?  if  you  are  acquainted,  remember  me 
kindly  to  him.  N.B.  If  my  little  thing  don't  succeed,  I  shall 
easily  survive,  having,  as  it  were,  compared  to  H.'s  venture, 
but  a  sixteenth  in  the  lottery.  Mary  and  I  are  to  sit  next  the 
orchestra  in  the  pit,  next^  the  dweedle-dees.  She  remem- 
bers you.  You  are  more  to  us  than  five  hundred  farces,  clap- 
pings, (fee. 

"  Come  back  one  day. 

«  C.  Lamb." 

Wednesday,  10th  December,  1806,  was  the  wished-for 
evening  which  decided  the  fate  of  "  Mr.  H."  on  the  boards  of 
Drury.  Great  curiosity  was  excited  by  the  announcement ; 
the  house  was  crowded  to  the  ceilin?;  and  the  audience  im- 
patiently  awaited  the  conclusion  of  the  long,  dull,  intolerable 
opera  of  "The  Travellers,"  by  which  it  was  preceded.  At 
length  Mr.  Elliston,  the  hero  of  the  farce,  entered,  gayly 
dressed,  and  in  happiest  spirits — enough,  not  too  much,  elated 
— and  delivered  the  prologue  with  great  vivacity  and  success. 
The  farce  began ;  at  first  it  was  much  applauded ;  but  the 
wit  seemed  wiredrawn ;  and  when  the  curtain  fell  on  the  first 
act,  the  friends  of  the  author  began  to  fear.  The  second  act 
dragged  heavily  on,  as  second  acts  of  farces  will  do  ;  a  rout 
at  Bath,  peopled  with  ill-dressed  and  over-dressed  actors  and 
actresses,  increased  the  disposition  to  yawn  ;  and  when  the 
moment  of  disclosure  came,  and  nothing  worse  than  the  name 
Hogsjlesh  was  heard,  the  audience  resented  the  long  play  on 
their  curiosity,  and  would  hear  no  more.  Lamb,  w^ith  his 
sister,  sat,  as  he  anticipated,  in  the  front  of  the  pit ;  and  hav- 
ing joined  in  encoring  the  epilogue,  the  brilliancy  of  which 
injured  the  farce,  he  gave  way  with  equal  pliancy  to  the  com- 
mon feeling,  and  hissed  and  hooted  as  loudly  as  any  of  his 
neighbours.  The  next  morning's  playbill  contained  a  vera- 
cious announcement,  that  "  the  new  farce  of  Mr.  H.,  performed 
for  the  frst  time  last  night,  teas  received  by  an  overflowing  au- 
dience with  universal  applause,  and  tvill  be  repeated  fur  the  sec- 
ond time  to-morrow ;"  but  the  stage  lamps  never  that  morrow 
saw!  Elliston  would  have  tried  it  again  ;  but  Lamb  saw  at 
once  that  the  case  was  hopeless,  and  consoled  his  friends  with 
a  century  of  puns  for  the  wreck  of  his  dramatic  hopes. 

G2 


148  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

[1807  to  1814] 
Letters  to  Manning,  Montague,  Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge. 

From  this  period,  the  letters  of  Lamb  which  have  been  pre- 
served are  comparatively  few,  with  reference  to  the  years 
through  which  they  are  scattered.  He  began  to  write  in  earnest 
for  the  press,  and  the  time  thus  occupied  was  withdrawn  from 
his  correspondents,  while  his  thoughts  and  feelings  were  de- 
veloped by  a  different  excitement,  and  expressed  in  other 
forms.  In  the  year  1807  the  series  of  stories  founded  on  the 
plays  of  Shakspeare,  referred  to  in  his  last  letter  to  Manning, 
was  published  ;  in  which  the  outlines  of  his  plots  are  happily 
brought  within  the  apprehension  of  children,  and  his  language 
preserved  wherever  it  was  possible  to  retain  it ;  a  fit  counter 
poise  to  these  works  addressed  to  the  young  understanding. 
to  which  Lamb  still  cherished  the  strong  distaste  which  broke 
out  in  one  of  his  previous  letters.  Of  these  tales,  King  Lear, 
Macbeth,  Timon  of  Athens,  Romeo  and  Juliet,  Hamlet,  and 
Othello,  are  by  Charles,  and  the  others  by  Mary  Lamb ;  hers 
being,  as  Lamb  always  insisted,  the  most  felicitous,  but  all 
well  adapted  to  infuse  some  sense  of  the  nobleness  of  the 
poet's  thoughts  into  the  hearts  of  their  little  readers.  Of  two 
other  works  preparing  for  the  press,  he  thus  speaks  in  a  let- 
ter, which  bears  date  26th  February,  1808,  addressed  to  Man- 
ning, at  Canton,  in  reply  to  a  letter  received  thence,  in  which 
Manning  informed  Lamb  that  he  had  consigned  a  parcel  of 
silk  to  a  Mr.  Knox  for  him. 

TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  Dear  Missionary — Your  letters  from  the  farthest  ends  of 
the  world  have  arrived  safe.  Mary  is  very  thankful  for  your 
remembrance  of  her ;  and,  with  the  less  suspicion  of  merce- 
nariness,  as  the  silk,  the  symbolum  materiale  of  your  friend- 
ship, has  not  yet  appeared.  I  think  Horace  says  somewhere, 
nox  longa.  I  would  not  impute  negligence  or  unhandsome 
delays  to  a  person  whom  you  have  honoured  with  your  confi- 
dence, but  I  have  not  heard  of  the  silk  or  of  Mr.  Knox  save 
by  your  letter.  Maybe  he  expects  the  first  advances !  or,  it 
may  be,  that  he  has  not  succeeded  in  getting  the  article  on 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  149 

shore,  for  it  is  among  the  res  pro1iibit(B  et  non  nisi  smuggle- 
ationis  vid  fruendcB.  But  so  it  is,  in  the  friendships  between 
wicked  men,  the  very  expressions  of  their  -good-will  cannot  but 
be  sinful.  I  suppose  you  know  my  farce  was  damned.  The 
noise  still  rings  in  my  ears.  Was  you  ever  in  the  pillory  ? 
being  damned  is  something  like  that.  A  treaty  of  marriage 
is  on  foot  between  William  Hazlitt  and  Miss  Stoddart.  Some- 
thing about  settlements  only  retards  it.  Little  Fenwick  (you 
don't  see  the  connexion  of  ideas  here,  how  the  devil  should 
you  ?)  is  in  the  rules  of  the  Fleet.  Cruel  creditors  !  operation 
of  iniquitous  laws  !  is  Magna  Charta,  then,  a  mockery  ?  Why, 
in  general  (here  I  suppose  you  to  ask  a  question),  my  spirits 
are  pretty  good,  but  I  have  my  depressions,  black  as  a  smith's 
beard,  Vulcanic,  Stygian.  At  such  times  I  have  recourse  to 
a  pipe,  which  is  like  not  being  at  home  to  a  dun  ;  he  comes 
again  with  tenfold  bitterness  the  next  day.  (Mind,  I  am  not  in 
debt,  I  only  borrow  a  similitude  from  others  ;  it  shows  ima- 
gination.) I  have  done  two  books  since  the  failure  of  my 
farce  ;  they  will  both  be  out  this  summer.  The  one  is  a  ju- 
venile book,  '  The  Adventures  of  Ulysses,'  intended  to  be  an 
introduction  to  the  reading  of  Telemachus !  it  is  done  out  of 
the  Odyssey,  not  from  the  Greek.  I  would  not  mislead  you  ; 
nor  yet  from  Pope's  Odyssey,  but  from  an  older  translation 
of  one  Chapman.  The  '  Shakspeare  Tales'  suggested  the 
doing  it.  Godwin  is,  in  both  those  cases,  my  bookseller. 
The  other  is  done  for  Longman,  and  is  'Specimens  of  Eng- 
lish Dramatic  Poets  contemporary  with  Shakspeare.'  Speci- 
mens are  becoming  fashionable.  We  have  '  Specimens  of 
Ancient  English  Poets' — '  Specimens  of  Modern  English  Po- 
ets'— 'Specimens  of  Ancient  English  Prose  Writers,'  without 
end.  They  used  to  be  called  '  Beauties.'  You  have  seen 
'  Beauties  of  Shakspeare  V  so  have  many  people  that  never 
saw  any  beauties  in  Shakspeare.  Longman  is  to  print  it,  and 
be  at  all  the  expense  and  risk,  and  I  am  to  share  the  profits 
after  all  deductions,  i.  e.,  a  year  or  two  hence  I  must  pocket 
what  they  please  to  tell  me  is  due  to  me.  But  the  book  is 
such  as  I  am  glad  there  should  be.  It  is  done  out  of  old 
plays  at  the  Museum,  and  out  of  Dodsley's  collection,  &c.  It 
is  to  have  notes.  So  I  go  creeping  on  since  I  was  lamed 
with  that  cursed  fall  from  off  the  top  of  Drury  Lane  Theatre 
into  the  pit,  something  more  than  a  year  ago.  However,  I  have 
been  free  of  the  house  ever  since,  and  the  house  was  pretty  free 
with  me  upon  that  occasion.  Hang  'em,  how  they  iiissed  !  it 
was  not  a  hiss  neither,  but  a  sort  of  a  frantic  yell,  like  a  congre- 
gation of  mad  geese,  with  roaring  sometimes  lik<>  hears,  mows 
and  mops  like  apes,  sometimes  snakes,  that  hissed  me  into  mad- 


160  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

ncss.  'Twas  like  St,  Anthony's  temptations.  Mercy  on  us, 
that  God  should  give  his  favourite  children,  men,  mouths  to 
speak  with,  to  discourse  rationally,  to  promise  smoothly,  to 
flatter  agreeably,  to  encourage  warmly,  to  counsel  wisely,  to 
sing  with,  to  drink  with,  and  to  kiss  with,  and  that  they  should 
turn  them  into  mouths  of  adders,  bears,  wolves,  hyenas,  and 
whistle  like  tempests,  and  emit  breath  through  them  like  dis- 
tillations of  aspic  poison,  to  asperse  and  vilify  the  innocent 
labours  of  their  fellow-creaiures  who  are  desirous  to  please 
them  !  Heaven  be  pleased  to  make  the  teeth  rot  out  of  them 
all,  therefore!  Make  them  a  reproach,  and  all  that  pass  by 
them  to  loll  out  their  tongue  at  them  !  Blind  mouihs  !  as 
Milton  somewhere  calls  them.  Do  you  like  Braham's  sing- 
ing? The  little  Jew  has  bewitched  me.  I  follow  him  like 
as  the  boys  followed  Tom  the  Piper.  I  was  insensible  to 
music  till  he  gave  me  a  new  sense.  Oh  that  you  could  go  to 
the  new  opera  of  Kais  to-night!  'Tis  all  about  Eastern  man- 
ners ;  it  would  just  suit  you.  It  describes  the  wild  Arabs, 
wandering  Egyptians,  lying  dervises,  and  all  that  sort  of  people, 
to  a  hair.  You  needn't  ha'  gone  so  far  to  see  what  you  see, 
if  you  saw  it  as  I  do  every  night  at  Drury  Lane  Theatre. 
Braham's  singing,  when  it  is  impassioned,  is  finer  than  Mrs. 
Siddon's,  or  Mr.  Kemble's  acting  ;  and  when  it  is  not  impas- 
sioned, it  is  as  good  as  hearing  a  person  of  fine  sense  talking. 
'I'he  brave  little  Jew !  I  made  a  pun  the  other  day,  and 
palmed  it  upon  Holcroft,  who  grinned  like  a  Cheshire  cat. 
(Why  do  cats  grin  in  Cheshire?  Because  it  was  once  a 
county  palatine,  and  the  cats  cannot  help  laughing  whenever 
they  think  of  it,  though  I  see  no  great  joke  in  it.)  I  said  that 
Holcroft  said,  being  asked  who  were  the  best  dramatic  writers 
of  the  day,  '  Hook  and  I.'  Mr.  Hook  is  author  of  several 
pieces,  Tekeli,  &:c.  You  know  what  hooks  and  eyes  are,  don't 
you?  Your  letter  had  many  things  in  it  hard  to  be  under- 
stood ;  the  puns  were  ready  and  Swift-like  ;  but  don't  you  be- 
gin to  be  melancholy  in  the  midst  of  Eastern  customs  !  '  The 
mind  does  not  easily  conform  to  foreign  usages,  even  in  trifles  : 
it  requires  something  that  it  has  been  familiar  with.'  That 
begins  one  of  Dr.  Hawkesworth's  papers  in  the  Adventurer, 
and  is,  I  think,  as  sensible  a  remark  as  ever  fell  from  the 
doctor's  mouth.  White  is  at  Christ's  Hospital,  a  wit  of  the 
first  magnitude,  but  had  rather  be  thought  a  gentleman,  like 
Congreve.  You  know  Congreve's  repulse,  which  he  gave  to 
Voltaire  when  he  came  to  visit  him  as  a  literary  man,  that 
he  wished  to  be  considered  only  in  the  light  of  a  private  gen- 
tleman. I  think  the  impertinent  Frenchman  was  properly 
answered.     I  should  just  serve  any  member  of  the  French 


DRAMATIC    SPECIMENS,    ETC.  151 

Institute  in  the  same   manner  that  wished  to  be   introduced 

to  me. 

****** 

"  Does  any  one  read  at  Canton  ?  Lord  Moira  is  president 
of  the  Westminster  Library.  I  suppose  you  might  have  in- 
terest with  Sir  Joseph  Banks  to  get  to  be  president  of  any 
similar  institution  that  should  be  set  up  at  Canton.  I  think 
public  reading-rooms  the  best  mode  of  educating  young  men. 
Solitary  reading  is  apt  to  give  the  headache.  Besides,  who 
knows  that  you  do  read  ?  There  are  ten  thousand  institutions 
similar  to  the  Royal  Institution  which  have  sprung  up  from  it. 
There  is  the  London  Institution,  the  Soulhwark  Institution, 
the  Russell  Square  Rooms  Institution,  &;c. — College  quasi  Con- 
ic ge,  a  place  where  people  read  together.  Wordsworth,  the 
great  poet,  is  coming  to  town  ;  he  is  to  have  apartments  in 
the  Mansion  House.  Well,  my  dear  Manning,  talking  can- 
not be  infinite  ;  I  have  said  all  I  have  to  say ;  the  rest  is 
but  remembrances,  which  we  shall  bear  in  our  heads  of  you 
while  we  have  heads.  Here  is  a  packet  of  trifles  nothing 
worth  ;  but  it  is  a  trifling  part  of  the  world  where  I  live  ; 
emptiness  abounds.  But  in  fulness  of  afl'ection  we  remain 
yours,  C.  L." 

The  two  books  referred  to  in  this  letter  were  shortly  after 
published.  "  The  Adventures  of  Ulysses"  had  some  tinge  of 
the  quaintness  of  Chapman  ;  it  gives  the  plot  of  the  earliest 
and  one  of  the  most  charming  of  romances,  without  spoiling 
its  interest.  The  "  Specimens  of  English  Dramatic  Poets 
who  lived  about  the  Time  of  Shakspeare"  were  received 
with  more  favour  than  Lamb's  previous  works,  though  it  was 
only  by  slow  and  imperceptible  degrees  that  they  won  their 
way  to  the  apprehensions  of  the  most  influential  minds,  and 
wrought  out  the  genial  purpose  of  the  editor  in  renewing  a 
taste  for  the  great  contemporaries  of  Shakspeare.  "  'i'he 
Monthly  Review"  vouchsafed  a  notice*  in  its  large  print,  upon 
the  whole  favourable,  according  to  the  existing  fashion  of 
criticism,  but  still  "craftily  qualified."  It  will  scarcely  be 
credited,  without  reference  lo  the  article  itself,  that  on  the 
notes  the  critic  pronounces  this  judgment :  "  The  notes  be- 
fore us  indeed  have  nothing  very  remarkable,  except  the 
style,  which  is  formally  abrupt  and  elaborately  quaint.  Some 
of  the  most  studied  attempts  to  display  excessive  feeling  we 
had  noted  for  animadversion,  but  the  task  is  unnecessary,"  &;c. 

It  is  easy  to  conceive  of  readers  strongly  dissenting  from 

•  April,  1809. 


152  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

some  of  the  passionate  eulogies  of  these  notes,  and  even  ta- 
king offence  at  the  boldness  of  the  allusions ;  but  that  any 
one  should  read  these  essences  of  criticism,  suggesting  the 
profoundest  thoughts,  and  replete  throughout  with  fine  ima- 
gery, and  find  in  them  "nothing  remarkable,"  is  a  mystery 
which  puzzles  us.  But  when  the  same  critic  speaks  of  the 
heroine  of  the  "  Broken  Heart"  as  "  the  light-heeled  Calan- 
iha,"  it  is  easy  to  appreciate  his  fitness  for  sitting  in  judg- 
ment on  the  old  English  drama  and  the  congenial  expositor 
of  its  grandeurs  ! 

In  this  year  Miss  Lamb  published  her  charming  work,  en- 
titled "  Mrs.  Leicester's  School,"  to  which  Lamb  contributed 
three  of  the  tales.  The  best,  however,  are  his  sister's,  as  he 
delighted  to  insist ;  and  no  tales  more  happily  adapted  to  nur- 
ture all  sweet  and  childlike  feelings  in  children  were  ever 
written.  Another  joint  publication,  "  Poetry  for  Children," 
followed,  which  also  is  worthy  of  its  title. 

Early  in  1809  Lamb  removed  from  Mitre-court  Buildings 
to  Southampton  Buildings,  but  only  for  a  few  months,  and 
preparatory  to  a  settlement  (which  he  meant  to  be  final)  in 
the  Temple.  The  next  letter  to  Manning  (still  in  China),  of 
28th  March,  1809,  is  from  Southampton  Buildings. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  So  there  is  one  of  your  friends  whom  you  will  never  see 
again !  Perhaps  the  next  fleet  may  bring  you  a  letter  from 
Martin  Burney,  to  say  that  he  writes  by  desire  of  Miss  Lamb, 
who  is  not  well  enough  to  write  herself,  to  inform  you  that  her 
brother  died  on  Thursday  last,  14th  June,  &lc.  But  I  hope 
not.  I  should  be  sorry  to  give  occasion  to  open  a  correspond- 
ence between  Martin  and  you.  This  letter  must  be  short, 
for  I  have  driven  it  ofi'  to  the  very  moment  of  doing  up  the 
packets ;  and  besides,  that  which  I  refer  to  above  is  a  very 
long  one  ;  and  if  you  have  received  my  books,  you  will  have 
enough  to  do  to  read  them.  While  I  think  on  it,  let  me  tell 
you  we  are  moved.  Don't  come  any  more  to  Mitre-court 
Buildings.  We  are  at  34  Southampton  Buildings,  Chancery- 
lane,  and  shall  be  here  till  about  the  end  of  May,  then  we  re- 
move to  No.  4  Inner  Temple-lane,  where  I  mean  to  live  and 
die ;  for  I  have  such  horror  of  movmg,  that  I  would  not  take 
a  benefice  from  the  king  if  I  was  not  indulged  with  nonresi- 
dence.  What  a  dislocation  of  comfort  is  comprised  in  that 
word  moving !  Such  a  heap  of  little  nasty  things,  after  you 
think  all  is  got  into  the  cart ;  old  dredging-boxes,  worn-out 
brushes,  gallipots,  vials,  things  that  it  is  impossible  the  most 
necessitous  person  can  ever  want,  but  which  the  women,  who 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  153 

preside  on  these  occasions,  will  not  leave  behind  if  it  was  to 
save  your  soul ;  they'd  keep  the  cart  ten  minutes  to  stow  in 
dirty  pipes  and  broken  matches,  to  show  their  economy. 
Then  you  can  find  nothing  you  want  for  many  days  after  you 
get  into  your  new  lodgings.  You  must  comb  your  hair  with 
your  fingers,  wash  your  hands  without  soap,  go  about  in  dirty 
gaiters.  Was  I  Diogenes,  I  would  not  move  out  of  a  kilder- 
kin into  a  hogshead,  though  the  first  had  nothing  but  small 
beer  in  it,  and  the  second  reeked  claret.  Our  place  of  final 
destination — I  don't  mean  the  grave,  but  No.  4  Inner  Temple- 
lane — looks  out  upon  a  gloomy  churchyard-like  court,  called 
Hare  Court,  with  three  trees  and  a  pump  in  it.  Do  you  know 
it  ?  I  was  born  near  it,  and  used  to  drink  at  that  pump  when 
I  was  a  Rechabite  of  six  years  old.  If  you  see  newspapers 
you  will  read  about  Mrs.  Clarke.  The  sensation  in  London 
about  this  nonsensical  business  is  marvellous.  I  remember 
nothing  in  my  life  like  it.  Thousands  of  ballads,  caricatures, 
lives  of  Mrs.  Clarke,  in  every  blind  alley.  Yet,  in  the  midst 
of  this  stir,  a  sublime  abstracted  dancing-master,  who  attends 
a  family  we  know  at  Kensington,  being  asked  a  question 
about  the  progress  of  the  examinations  in  the  House,  inquired 
who  Mrs.  Clarke  was  ?  He  had  heard  nothinir  of  it.  He 
had  evaded  this  omnipresence  by  utter  insignificancy !  The 
duke  should  make  that  man  his  confidential  valet.  I  pro- 
posed locking  him  up,  barring  him  the  use  of  his  fiddle  and 
red  pumps,  until  he  had  minutely  perused  and  committed  to 
memory  the  whole  body  of  the  examinations,  which  employed 
the  House  of  Commons  a  fortnight,  to  teach  him  to  be  more 
attentive  to  what  concerns  the  public.  I  think  I  told  you  of 
Godwin's  little  book  and  of  Coleridge's  prospectus  in  my 
last ;  if  I  did  not,  remind  me  of  it,  and  I  will  send  you  them, 
or  an  account  of  them,  next  fleet.     I  have  no  conveniency  of 

doing  it  by  this.     Mrs. grows  every  day  in  disfavour 

with  me.  I  will  be  buried  with  this  inscription  over  me  : — 
*Here  lies  C.  L.,  the  woman-hater:'  1  mean,  that  hated  one 
woman  :  for  the  rest,  God  bless  them  !  How  do  you  like  the 
Mandarinesses  ?  Are  you  on  some  little  footing  with  any  of 
them  ?  This  is  Wednesday.  On  Wednesdays  is  my  levee. 
The  captain,  Martin,  Phillips  (not  the  sherifl'),  Rickman,  and 
some  more,  are  constant  attendants,  besides  stray  visiters. 
We  play  at  whist,  eat  cold  meat  and  liot  potatoes,  and  any 
gentleman  that  chooses  smokes.  Why  do  you  never  drop  in? 
You'll  come  some  day,  won't  you  ? 

"  C.  La.mb,  &c." 

His  next  is  after  his  removal  to  the  Temple. 

Li  3 


154  LETTERS  TO    MANNING. 


TO    MR.    MANNING. 


"  Dear  Manning — When  I  last  wrote  you  I  was  in  lodg- 
ings. I  am  now  in  chambers,  No.  4  Inner  Temple-lane, 
where  I  should  be  happy  to  see  you  any  evening.  Bring  any 
of  your  friends,  the  Mandarins,  with  you.  I  have  two  sitting- 
rooms  :  I  call  them  so  par  excellence^  for  you  may  stand,  or 
loll,  or  lean,  or  try  any  posture  in  tliem,  but  they  are  best  for 
sitting ;  not  squatting  down  Japanese  fashion,  but  the  more 
decorous  mode  which  European  usage  has  consecrated.  1 
have  two  of  these  rooms  on  the  third  floor,  and  five  sleeping, 
cooking,  &LC.  rooms  on  the  fourth  floor.  In  my  best  room  is  a 
choice  collection  of  the  works  of  Hogarth,  an  English  painter, 
of  some  humour.  In  my  next  best  are  shelves  containing  a 
small  but  well-chosen  library.  My  best  room  commands  a 
court,  in  which  there  are  trees  and  a  pump,  the  water  of  which 
is  excellent  cold  with  brandy,  and  not  very  insipid  without. 
Here  I  hope  to  set  up  my  rest,  and  not  quit  till  Mr.  Powell, 
the  undertaker,  gives  me  notice  that  I  may  have  possession  of 
my  last  lodging.  He  lets  lodgings  for  single  gentlemen.  I 
sent  you  a  parcel  of  books  by  my  last  to  give  you  some  idea 
of  the  state  of  European  literature.  There  comes  with  this 
two  volumes,  done  up  as  letters,  of  minor  poetry,  a  sequel  to 
Mrs.  'Leicester;'  the  best  you  may  suppose  mine;  the  next 
best  are  my  coadjutor's  ;  you  may  amuse  yourself  in  guessing 
them  out ;  but  I  must  tell  you  mine  are  but  one  third  in  quan- 
tity of  the  whole.  So  much  for  a  very  delicate  subject.  It 
is  hard  to  speak  of  one's  self,  <fec.  Holcroft  had  finished  his 
life  when  I  wrote  to  you,  and  Hazlitt  has  since  finished  his 
life ;  I  do  not  mean  his  own  life,  but  he  has  finished  a  life  of 
Holcroft,  which  is  going  to  press.  Tuthill  is  Doctor  Tuthill. 
I  continue  Mr.  Lamb.  I  have  published  a  little  book  for 
children  on  titles  of  honour ;  and,  to  give  them  some  idea  of 
the  difference  of  rank  and  gradual  rising,  I  have  made  a  little 
scale,  supposing  myself  to  receive  the  following  various  ac- 
cessions of  dignity  from  the  king,  who  is  the  fountain  of  hon- 
our— As  at  first,  1.  Mr.  C.  Lamb  ;  2.  C.  Lamb,  Esq.  ;  3.  Sir 
C.  Lamb,  Bart.  ;  4.  Baron  Lamb  of  Stamford  ;*  5.  Viscount 
Lamb ;  6.  Earl  Lamb ;  7.  Marquis  Lamb ;  8.  Duke  Lamb. 
It  would  look  like  quibbling  to  carry  it  on  further,  and  espe- 
cially as  it  is  not  necessary  for  children  to  go  beyond  the  or- 
dinary titles  of  sub-regal  dignity  in  our  own  country,  other- 
wise I  have  sometimes  in  my  dreams  imagined  myself  still 
advancing,  as  9ih,  King  Lamb;   10th,  Emperor  Lamb;  11th, 

*  "  Where  my  family  came  from.  I  have  chosen  that  if  ever  I  should  have 
my  choice." 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  155 

Pope  Innocent,  higher  than  which  is  nothing.  Puns  I  have 
not  made  many  (nor  punch  much)  since  the  date  of  my  last ; 
one  I  cannot  help  relating.  A  constable  in  Salisbury  Cathe- 
dral was  telling  me  that  eight  people  dined  at  the  top  of  the 
spire  of  the  cathedral,  upon  which  I  remarked  that  they  must 
be  very  sharp  set.  But,  in  general,  I  cultivate  the  reasoning 
part  of  my  mind  more  than  the  imaginative.  I  am  stuffed  out 
so  with  eating  turkey  for  dinner,  and  another  turkey  for  sup- 
per yesterday  (Turkey  in  Europe  and  Turkey  in  Asia),  that  I 
can't  jog  on.  It  is  Newyear  here.  That  is,  it  was  Newyear 
half  a  year  back,  when  1  was  writing  this.  Nothing  puzzles 
me  more  than  time  and  space,  and  yet  nothing  puzzles  me  less, 
for  I  never  think  about  them.  The  Persian  ambassador  is 
the  principal  thing  talked  of  now.  I  sent  some  people  to  see 
him  worship  the  suri  on  Primrose  Hill,  at  half  past  six  in  the 
morning,  28th  November ;  but  he  did  not  come,  which  makes 
me  think  the  old  fire-worshippers  are  a  sect  almost  extinct  in 
Persia.  The  Persian  ambassador's  name  is  Shaw  Ali  Mirza. 
The  common  people  call  him  Shaw  Nonsense.  While  I  think 
of  it,  I  have  put  three  letters  besides  my  own  three  into  the 
India  post  for  you,  from  your  brother,  sister,  and  some  gentle- 
man whose  name  I  forget.  Will  they,  have  they,  did  they, 
come  safe  ?  The  distance  you  are  at  cuts  up  tenses  by  the 
root.  I  think  you  said  you  did  not  know  Kate  *«*******.  J 
express  her  by  nine  stars,  though  she  is  but  one.  You  must 
have  seen  her  at  her  father's.  Try  and  remember  her.  Cole- 
ridge is  bringing  out  a  paper  in  weekly  numbers,  called  the 
'  Friend,'  which  I  would  send  if  I  could  ;  but  the  difhculty  I 
had  in  getting  the  packets  of  books  out  to  you  before  deters 
me  ;  and  you'll  want  something  new  to  read  when  you  come 
home.  Except  Kate,  I  have  had  no  vision  of  excellence  this 
year,  and  she  passed  by  like  the  queen  on  her  coronation  day  ; 
you  don't  know  whether  you  saw  her  or  not.  Kate  is  fifteen; 
I  go  about  moping,  and  sing  the  old  pathetic  ballad  I  used  to 
like  in  my  youth — 

'  She's  sweet  fifteen, 
I'm  one  year  more.' 

•'  Mrs.  Bland  sung  it  in  boy's  clothes  the  first  time  I  heard 
it.  I  sometimes  think  the  lower  notes  in  my  voice  are  like 
Mrs.  Bland's.  That  glorious  singer,  Braham,  one  of  my  lights, 
is  fled.  He  was  for  a  season.  He  was  a  rare  composition 
of  the  Jew,  the  gentleman,  and  the  angel,  yet  all  these  ele- 
ments mixed  up  so  kindly  in   him,  that  you  could  not  tell 

which  preponderated  ;  but  he  is  gone,  and  one is  engaged 

instead.     Kate  is  vanished,  but   Miss  B is  always  to  be 

met  with  ! 


156  LETTER    TO    MONTAGUE. 

'  Queens  drop  away,  while  blue-legg'd  Maukin  thrives; 
And  courtly  Mildred  dies  while  country  Madge  survives.' 

That  is  not  my  poetry,  but  Quarles's  ;  but  haven't  you  observed 
that  the  rarest  things  are  the  least  obvious  ?  Don't  show  any- 
body the  names  in  this  letter.  I  write  confidentially,  and 
wish  this  letter  to  be  considered  as  private.  Hazlitt  has  writ- 
ten a  grammar  for  Godwin ;  Godwin  sells  it  bound  up  with  a 
treatise  of  his  own  on  language,  but  the  gray  mare  is  the  bet- 
ter horse.     I  don't  allude  to  Mrs. ,  but  to  the  word  gram- 

mar.,  which  comes  near  to  gray  mare,  if  you  observe,  in  sound. 
That  figure  is  called  paranomasia  in  Greek.  I  am  sometimes 
happy  in  it.  An  old  woman  begged  of  me  for  charity.  '  Ah! 
sir,'  said  she,  '  I  have  seen  better  days.'  '  So  have  I,  good 
woman,'  I  replied  ;  but  I  meant  literally,  days  not  so  rainy 
and  overcast  as  that  on  which  she  begged  :  she  meant  more 
prosperous  days.  Mr.  Dawe  is  made  associate  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  by  what  law  of  association  I  can't  guess.  Mrs. 
Holcroft,  Miss  Holcroft,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Godwin,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Hazlitt,  Mrs.  Martin  and  Louisa,  Mrs.  Lum,  Capt.  Burney, 
Mrs.  Burney,  Martin  Burney,  Mr.  Rickman,  Mrs.  Rickman, 
Dr.  Stoddart,  William  Dollin,  Mr.  Thompson,  Mr,  and  Mrs. 
Norris,  Mr.  Fenwick,  Mrs.  Fenwick,  Miss  Fen  wick,  a  man 
that  saw  you  at  our  house  one  day,  and  a  lady  that  heard  me 
speak  of  you ;  Mrs  BuflTam  that  heard  Hazlitt  mention  you. 
Dr.  Tuthill,  Mrs.  Tuthill,  Colonel  Harwood,  Mrs.  Harwood, 
Mr.  Collier,  Mrs.  Collier,  Mr.  Sutton,  Nurse,  Mr.  Fell,  Mrs. 
Fell,  Mr.  Marshall,  are  very  well,  and  occasionally  inquire 
after  you. 

"  I  remain  yours  ever, 

"  Ch.  Lamb. 
"  2d  January,  1810." 

In  the  summer  of  1810  Lamb  and  his  sister  spent  their 
holydays  with  Hazlitt,  who,  having  married  Miss  Stoddart, 
was  living  in  a  house  belonging  to  his  wife's  family  at  Win- 
terslow,  on  the  border  of  Salisbury  Plain.  The  following 
letter,  of  12th  July  in  this  year,  was  addressed  to  Mr.  Mon- 
tague, who  had  urged  him  to  employ  a  part  of  his  leisure  in  a 
compilation. 

TO    MR.    MONTAGUE. 

"  Dear  Montague — I  have  turned  and  twisted  the  MSS.  in 
my  head,  and  can  make  nothing  of  them.  I  knew  when  I  took 
them  that  I  could  not,  but  I  do  not  like  to  do  an  act  of  ungra- 
cious necessity  at  once ;  so  I  am  ever  committing  myself  by 
half  engagements  and  total  failures.      I   cannot  make  any- 


LETTER    TO    MONTAGUE.  157 

body  understand  why  I  can't  do  sucli  things ;  it  is  a  defect  in 
my  occiput.     I  cannot  put  other  people's  thoughts  together; 
I  forget  every  paragraph  as  fast  as  I  read  it ;  and  my  head 
has  received  such  a  shock  by  an  all-night  journey  on  the  top 
of  the  coach,  that  I  shall  have   enough  to  do  to  nurse  it  into 
its  natural  pace  before  I  go  home.     I  must  devote  myself  to 
imbecility  ;  I  must  be  gloriously  useless  while  I  stay  here. 
How  is   Mrs.  M.  ?  will  she   pardon  my  inefficiency  ?     The 
city  of  Salisbury  is  full  of  weeping  and  wailing.     The  bank 
has  stopped  payment  ;  and  everybody  in  the  town  kept  money 
at  it,  or  has  got  some  of  its  notes.     Some  have  lost  all  they 
had  in  the  world.     It  is  the  next  thing  to  seeing  a  city  with 
the  plague  within  its  walls.     The  Wilton  people  are  all  un- 
done ;  all  the  manufacturers  there  kept  cash  at  the  Salisbury 
bank  ;  and  I  do  suppose  it  to  be  the  unhappiest  county  in 
England  this,  where  I  am  making  holyday.     We  purpose  set- 
ting out  for  Oxford  Tuesday  fortnight,  and  coming  thereby 
home.     But  no  more  night  travelling.     My  head  is  sore  (un- 
derstand it  of  the  inside)  with  that  deduction  from  my  natural 
rest  which  I  suffered  coming  down.     Neither  Mary  nor  I  can 
spare  a  morsel  of  our  rest ;  it  is  incumbent  on  us  to  be  misers 
of  it.     Travelling  is  not  good  for  us,  we  travel  so  seldom.     If 
the  sun  be  hell,  it  is  not  for  the  fire,  but  for  the  sempiternal 
motion  of  that  miserable   body  of  light.     How  much  more 
dignified  leisure  hath  a  muscle,  glued  to  his  unpassable  rocky 
limit,  two  inches  square  !     He  hears  the  tide  roll  over  him, 
backward  and  forward,  twice   a  day  (as  the  Salisbury  long 
coach  goes  and  returns  in  foriy-eight  hours),  but  knows  better 
than  to  take  an  outside  night-place  a  top  on't.     He  is  the  owl 
of  the  sea — Minerva's  fish — the  fish  of  wisdom. 
"  Our  kindest  remembrances  to  Mrs.  M. 

"  Yours  truly, 

"C.  Lamb." 

The  following  is  Lamb's  postscript  to  a  letter  of  Miss  Lamb 
to  Miss  Wordsworth,  after  their  return  to  London : 

"  Mary  has  left  a  little  space  for  me  to  fill  up  with  non- 
sense, as  the  geographers  used  to  cram  monsters  in  llu>  v<Mds 
of  the  maps,  and  call  it  Terra  Incognita.  She  has  told  you  how 
she  has  taken  to  water  like  a  hungry  otter.  I  too  limp  after 
her  in  lame  imitation,  but  it  goes  against  me  a  little  at  first. 
I  have  been  acquaintance  with  it  now  for  full  four  days,  audit 
seems  a  moon.  I  am  full  of  cramps,  and  rheumatisms,  and 
cold  internally,  so  that  fire  won't  warm  me  ;  yet  I  bear  all  for 
virtue's  sake.  Must  I  then  leave  you,  gin,  rum,  brandy, 
14 


158  QUARTERLY    REVIEW. 

aquavitse,  pleasant  jolly  fellows  ?  Hang  temperance  and  he 
that  first  invented  it !  some  Anti-Noahite.  C has  pow- 
dered his  head,  and  looks  like  Bacchus,  Bacchus  ever  sleek 
and  young.  He  is  going  to  turn  sober,  but  his  clock  has 
not  struck  yet ;  meantime  he  pours  down  goblet  after  goblet, 
the  second  to  see  where  the  first  is  gone,  the  third  to  see  no 
harm  happens  to  the  second,  a  fourth  to  say  there  is  another 
coming,  and  a  fifth  to  say  he  is  not  sure  he  is  the  last." 

In  the  autumn  of  this  year,  the  establishment  of  a  Quarterly 
Magazine,  entitled  the  "  Reflector,"  opened  a  new  sphere  for 
Lamb's  powers  as  a  humourist  and  critic.  Its  editor,  Mr. 
Leigh  Hunt,  having  been  educated  in  the  same  school,  en- 
joyed many  associations  and  friendships  in  common  with  him, 
and  was  thus  able  to  excite  in  Lamb  the  greatest  motive  for 
exertion  in  the  zeal  of  kindness.  In  this  magazine  appeared 
some  of  Lamb's  noblest  effusions  ;  his  essay  "  On  Garrick  and 
Acting,"  which  contains  the  character  of  Lear,  perhaps  the 
noblest  criticism  ever  written,  and  on  the  noblest  human  sub- 
ject; his  delightful  "Essays  on  Hogarth;"  his  "Farewell  to 
Tobacco,"  and  several  of  the  choicest  of  his  gayer  pieces. 

The  number  of  the  Quarterly  Review  for  December,  1811, 
contained  an  attack  upon  Lamb,  which  it  would  be  difficult, 
as  well  as  painful,  to  characterize  as  it  deserves.  Mr.  We- 
ber, in  his  edition  of  "  Faust,"  had  extracted  Lamb's  note  on 
the  catastrophe  of "  The  Broken  Heart,"  in  which  Lamb, 
speaking  of  that  which  he  regarded  as  the  highest  exhibition 
of  tragic  suffering  which  human  genius  had  depicted,  dared  an 
illusion  which  was  perhaps  too  bold  for  those  who  did  not  un- 
derstand the  peculiar  feeling  by  which  it  was  suggested,  but 
which  no  unprejudiced  mind  could  mistake  for  the  breathing 
of  other  than  a  pious  spirit.  In  reviewing  Mr.  Weber,  the 
critic,  who  was  also  the  editor  of  the  Review,  thus  complains 
of  the  quotation — "  We  have  a  more  serious  charge  to  bring 
against  the  editor  than  the  omission  of  points,  or  the  misap- 
prehension of  words.  He  has  polluted  his  pages  with  the 
blasphemies  of  a  poor  maniac,  who,  it  seems,  once  published 
some  detached  scenes  of  the  *  Broken  Heart.'  For  this  un- 
fortunate creature  every  feeling  mind  will  find  an  apology  in 
his  calamitous  situation  ;  but  for  Mr.  Weber,  we  know  not 
where  the  warmest  of  his  friends  will  find  palliation  or  ex- 
cuse." It  would  be  unjust  to  attribute  this  paragraph  to  the 
accidental  association  of  Lamb  in  literary  undertakings  with 
persons  like  Mr.  Hunt,  strongly  oppbsed  to  the  political  opin- 
ions of  Mr.  GifTord.  It  seems  rather  the  peculiar  expression 
of  the  distaste  of  a  small  though  acute  mind  for  an  original 


SONNET — EPIGRAM.  159 

power  which  it  could  not  appreciate,  and  which  disturbed  the 
conventional  associations  of  which  it  was  master,  aggravated 
by  bodily  weakness  and  disease.  Notwithstanding  this  at- 
tack, Lamb  was  prompted  by  his  admiration  for  Wordsworth's 
"  Excursion"  to  contribute  a  review  of  that  work,  on  its  ap- 
pearance, to  the  Quarterly,  and  he  anticipated  great  pleasure 
in  the  poet's  approval  of  his  criticism  ;  but,  when  the  review 
appeared,  the  article  was  so  mercilessly  mangled  by  the  ed- 
itor, that  Lamb  entreated  Wordsworth  not  to  read  it.  For 
these  grievances  Lamb  at  length  took  a  very  gentle  revenge 
in  the  following 

SONNET. 

SAINT    CRISPIN   TO    MR.    GIFFORD. 

All  unadvised,  and  in  an  evil  hour, 
Lured  by  aspiring  thoughts,  my  son,  you  daft 
The  lowly  labours  of  the  "  Gentle  Craft" 
For  learned  toils,  which  blood  and  spirits  sour. 
All  things,  dear  pledge,  are  not  in  all  men's  power 
The  wiser  sort  of  shrub  affects  the  ground  ; 
And  sweet  content  of  mind  is  oftener  found 
In  cobbler's  parlour  than  in  critic's  bower. 
The  sorest  work  is  what  doth  cross  the  grain; 
And  better  to  this  hour  you  had  been  plying 
The  obsequious  awl,  with  well-waxed  finger  flying, 
Than  ceaseless  thus  to  till  a  thankless  vein  : 
Still  teasing  muses  which  are  stiU  denying; 
Making  a  stretching-leather  of  your  brain. 
St.  Crisptn''s  Eve. 

Lamb,  as  we  have  seen,  cared  nothing  for  politics f-yet  his 
desire  to  serve  his  friends  sometimes  induced  him  to  adopt  for 
a  short  time  their  view  of  public  affairs,  and  assist  them  with 
a  harmless  pleasantry.  The  following  epigram  on  the  disap- 
pointment of  the  whig  associates  of  the  regent  appeared  in 
the  "  Examiner." 

Ye  politicians,  tell  me,  pray, 
"While  thus  with  wo  and  care  rent  ? 
This  is  the  worst  that  you  can  say, 
Some  wind  has  blown  the  Wig  away, 
And  left  the  Hair  Apparent. 

The  following,  also  published  in  the  same  paper,  would 
probably  have  only  caused  a  smile  if  read  by  the  regent  him- 
self, and  may  now  be  republished  without  offence  to  any  one. 
At  the  time  when  he  wrote  it.  Lamb  used  to  stop  any  passion- 
ate attacks  upon  the  prince  with  the  smiling  remark,  "  /  love 
my  regent," 


160  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  THE  WHALE. 

lo  !  Paean  !     lo  !  sing, 
To  the  finny  people's  king, 
Not  a  mightier  whale  than  this 
In  the  vast  Atlantic  is. 
Not  a  fatter  fish  than  he 
Flounders  round  the  Polar  Sea. 
See  his  blubber — at  his  gills 
What  a  world  of  drink  he  swills ! 
From  his  trunk,  as  from  a  spout, 
Which  next  moment  he  pours  out. 

Such  his  person.     Next  declare, 
Muse,  who  his  companions  are  : 
Every  fish  of  generous  kind 
Scuds  aside,  or  slinks  behind; 
But  about  his  presence  keep 
All  the  monsters  of  the  deep  ; 
Mermaids,  with  their  tails  and  singing. 
His  dehghted  fancy  stinging ; 
Crooked  dolphins,  they  surround  him ; 
Doglike  seals,  they  fawn  around  him  ; 
Following  hard,  the  progress  mark 
Of  the  intolerant  salt  sea  shark  ; 
For  his  solace  and  relief. 
Flatfish  are  his  courtiers  chief; 
Last  and  lowest  in  his  train, 
Inkfish  (libellers  of  the  main). 
Their  black  liqnor  shed  in  spite  : 
(Such  on  earth  the  things  that  write.) 
In  his  stomach,  some  do  say, 
No  good  thing  can  ever  stay  : 
Had  it  been  the  fortune  of  it 
To  have  swallow'd  that  old  prophet. 
Three  days  there  he'd  not  have  dwell'd, 
But  in  one  have  been  expell'd. 
Hapless  mariners  are  they, 
Who,  beguiled  (as  seamen  say), 
Deeming  him  some  rock  or  island, 
Footing  sure,  safe  spot,  and  dry  land, 
Anchor  in  his  scaly  rind — 
Soon  the  difference  they  find  ; 
Sudden  plumb  !  he  sinks  beneath  them, 
Does  to  ruthless  seas  bequeath  them. 

Name  or  title  what  has  he  ? 
Is  he  Regent  of  the  Sea  ? 
From  this  difficulty  free  us, 
Buffon,  Banks,  or  sage  Linnaeus, 
With  his  wondrous  attributes, 
Say,  what  appellation  suits? 
By  his  bulk,  and  by  his  size, 
By  his  oily  qualities. 
This  (or  else  my  eyesight  fails), 
This  should  be  the  Prince  of  Whales. 

The  devastation  of  the  Park  in  the  summer  of  1814,  by 
reason  of  the  rejoicings  on  the  visit  of  the  allied  sovereigns, 
produced  the  following  letter  from  Lamb  to  Wordsworth. 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

**  Save  for  a  late  excursion  to  Harrow,  and  a  day  or  two 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  161 

on  the  banks  of  the  Thames  this  summer,  rural  images  were 
fast  fading  from  my  mind,  and  by  the  wise  provision  of  the 
regent  all  that  was  countryfied  in  the  parks  is  just  obliter- 
ated. The  very  colour  of  green  is  vanished,  the  whole  sur- 
face of  Hyde  Park  is  dry  crumbling  sand  (Arabia  Arenosa), 
not  a  vestige  or  hint  of  grass  ever  having  grown  there  ;  booths 
and  drinking-places  go  all  round  it,  for  a  mile  and  a  half  I  am 
confident — 1  might  say  two  miles,  in  circuit — the  stench  of 
liquors,  had  tobacco,  dirty  people,  and  provisions,  conquers 
the  air,  and  we  are  all  stifled  and  suffocated  in  Hyde  Park. 
Order  after  order  has  been  issued  by  Lord  Sidmouth  in  the 
name  of  the  regent  (acting  in  behalf  of  his  royal  father)  for 
the  dispersion  of  the  varlets,  but  in  vain.  The  vis  unita  of  all 
the  publicans  in  London,  Westminster,  Marylebone,  and  miles 
round,  is  too  powerful  a  force  to  put  down.  The  regent 
has  raised  a  phantom  which  he  cannot  lay.  "^I'here  they'll 
stay,  probably,  for  ever.  The  whole  beauty  of  the  place  is 
gone — that  lake-look  of  the  Serpentine — it  has  got  foolish 
ships  upon  it — but  something  whispers  to  have  confidence  in 
nature  and  its  revival — 

At  the  coming  of  the  milder  day. 

These  monuments  shall  all  be  overgrown. 

Meantime  I  confess  to  have  smoked  one  delicious  pipe  in  one 
of  the  cleanliest  and  goodliest  of  the  booths  ;  a  tent  rather — 

■    '  Oh  call  it  not  a  booth  !' 

erected  by  the  public  spirit  of  Watson,  who  keeps  the  Adam 
and  Eve  at  Pancras  (the  alehouses  have  all  emigrated,  with 
their  train  of  bottles,  mugs,  corkscrews,  waiters,  into  Hyde 
Park — whole  alehouses  with  all  their  ale  !),  in  company  with 
some  of  the  Guards  that  had  been  in  France,  and  a  fine  French 
girl,  habited  like  a  princess  of  banditti,  which  one  of  the  dogs 
had  transported  from  the  Garonne  to  the  Serpentine.  The 
unusual  scene  in  Hyde  Park,  by  candlelight,  in  open  air, 
good  tobacco,  bottled  stout,  made  it  look  like  an  interval  in  a 
campaign,  a  repose  after  battle.  I  almost  fancied  scars  smart- 
ing, and  was  ready  to  club  a  story  with  my  comrades  of  some 
of  my  lying  deeds.  After  all,  the  fireworks  were  splendid  ; 
the  rockets  in  clusters,  in  trees,  and  all  shapes,  spreading 
about  like  young  stars  in  the  making,  floundering  about  in 
space  (like  unbroke  horses),  till  some  of  Newton's  calcula- 
tions should  fix  them  ;  but  then  they  went  out.  Any  one  who 
could  see  'em,  and  the  still  finer  showers  of  gloomy  rain-fire 
that  fell  sulkily  and  angrily  from  'em,  and  could  go  to  bed 
without  dreaming  of  the  last  day,  must  be  a  liardoned  atheist. 
"Again  let  me  thank  you  for  your  present,  and  assure  yoi\ 
14» 


162  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

that  fireworks  and  triumphs  have  not  distracted  me  from  re- 
ceiving a  calm  and  noble  enjoyment  from  it  (which  I  trust  I 
shall  often),  and  I  sincerely  congratulate  you  on  its  appearance. 

*'  With  kindest  remembrances  to  you  and  household,  we  re 
main  yours  sincerely, 

"  C.  Lamb  and  Sister. 

"  9th  August,  1814." 

The  following  are  fragments  of  letters  to  Coleridge  in  the 
same  month.  The  first  is  in  answer  to  a  solicitation  of  Cole- 
ridge for  a  supply  of  German  books. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  13th  Aug.,  1814. 
"  Dear  Resuscitate — There  comes  to  you  by  the  vehicle 
from  Ladlane  this  day  a  volume  of  German  ;  what  it  is  I  can- 
not justly  say,  the  characters  of  those  northern  nations  having 
been  always  singularly  harsh  and  unpleasant  to  me.     It  is  a 

contribution  of  Dr.  towards  your  wants,  and  you  would 

have  had  it  sooner  but  for  an  odd  accident.  I  wrote  for  it 
three  days  ago,  and  the  doctor,  as  he  thought,  sent  it  me.  A 
book  of  like  exterior  he  did  send,  but,  being  disclosed,  how  far 
unlike  !  It  was  the  '  Well-bred  Scholar,'  a  book  with  which, 
it  seems,  the  doctor  laudably  fills  up  those  hours  which  he 
can  steal  from  his  medical  avocations  (Chesterfield,  Blair,  Be- 
attie,  portions  from  '  The  Life  of  Savage,'  make  up  a  pretty ish 
system  of  morality  and  the  belles  lettres,  which  Mr.  Mylne,  a 
schoolmaster,  has  properly  brought  together,  and  calls  the  col- 
lection by  the  denomination  above  mentioned) ;  the  doctor 
had  no  sooner  discovered  his  error,  than  he  despatched  man 
and  horse  to  rectify  the  mistake,  and,  with  a  pretty  kind  of  in- 
genuous modesty  in  his  note,  seemeth  to  deny  any  knowledge 
of  the  '  Well-bred  Scholar  ;'  false  modesty,  surely,  and  a  blush 
misplaced  ;  for  what  more  pleasing  than  the  consideration  of 
professional  austerity  thus  relaxing,  thus  improving!  But  so, 
when  a  child,  I  remember  blushing,  being  caught  on  my  knees, 
or  doing  otherwise  some  pious  and  praiseworthy  action  :  now 
1  rather  love  such  things  to  be  seen.  Henry  Crabb  Robinson 
is  out  upon  his  circuit,  and  his  books  are  inaccessible  without 
his  leave  and  key.  He  is  attending  the  Norfolk  Circuit — a 
short  term,  but  to  him,  as  to  many  young  lawyers,  a  long  va- 
cation, sufiiciently  dreary.*  I  thought  1  could  do  no  better 
than  transmit  to  him,  not  extracts,  but  your  very  letter  itself, 
than  which  I  think  I  never  read  anything  more  moving,  more 

*  A  mistake  of  Lamb's,  at  which  the  excellent  person  referred  to  may  smile, 
now  that  he  has  retired  from  his  profession,  and  has  no  business  but  the  offices 
of  kindness. 


LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE.  168 

pathetic,  or  more  conducive  to  the  purpose  of  persuasion. 
'I'he  Crab  is  a  sour  Crab  if  it  does  not  sweeten  him.  I  think 
it  would  draw  another  third  volume  of  Dodsley  out  of  me  ; 
but  you  say  you  don't  want  any  English  books  ?  Perhaps, 
after  all,  that's  as  well  ;  one's  romantic  credulity  is  for  ever 
misleading  one  into  misplaced  acts  of  foolery.  Crab  might 
have  answered  by  this  time  ;  his  juices  take  a  long  time  sup- 
plying, bui  they'll  run  at  last — I  know  they  will — pure  golden 
pij)pin.  A  fearful  rumour  has  since  reached  me  that  the  Crab 
is  on  the  eve  of  setting  out  for  France.  If  he  is  in  England 
your  letter  will  reach  him,  and  I  flatter  myself  a  touch  of  he 
persuasive  of  my  own,  which  accompanies  it,  will  not  be 
thrown  away  :  if  it  be,  he  is  a  sloe,  and  no  true-hearted  crab, 
and  there's  an  end.  For  that  life  of  the  German  conjuror 
which  you  speak  of,  '  Colerus  de  Vita  Doctoris  vix-Intelligi- 
bilis,'  I  perfectly  remember  the  last  evening  we  spent  with 

Mrs.  M and  Miss  B ,  in  London-street  (by  that  token 

we  had  rabbits  for  supper,  and  Miss  B prevailed  upon  me 

to  take  a  glass  of  brandy  and  water  after  supper,  which  is  not 
my  habit)  —  I  perfectly  remember  reading  portions  of  that  life 
in  their  parlour,  and  I  think  it  must  be  among  their  packages. 
It  was  the  very  last  evening  we  were  at  that  house.     What  is 

gone  of  that  frankhearted  circle,  M ,  and  his  gos-letiuces' 

He  ate  walnuts  better  than  any  man  I  ever  knew.  Friend- 
ships m  these  parts  stagnate. 

"  I  am  going  to  eat  turbot,  turtle,  venison,  marrow  pudd. — 
cold  punch,  claret,  Madeira — at  our  annual  feast,  at  half  past 
four  this  day.  'I'hey  keep  bothering  me  (I'm  in  office),  and 
my  ideas  are  confused.  Let  me  know  if  I  can  be  of  any  ser- 
vice as  to  books.  God  forbid  the  Architectonican  should  be 
sacrificed  to  a  foolish  scruple  of  some  book-proprietor,  as  if 
books  did  not  belong  with  the  highest  propriety  to  those  that 
understand  'em  best.  C.  Lamb." 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"2Glh  August,  I8I4. 

*'  Let  the  hungry  soul  rejoice,  there  is  corn  in  Egypt. 
Whatever  thou  hast  been  told  to  the  contrary  by  designing 
friends,  who  perhaps  inquired  carelessly,  or  did  not  incjuiro  at 
all,  in  hope  of  saving  their  money,  there  is  a  stock  of  '  Re- 
morse'on  hand,  enougli,  as  Pople  conjectures,  for  seven  years* 
consumption,  judging  from  expericMice  of  the  last  two  years. 
Meihinks  it  makes  for  the  benefit  of  sound  literature,  that  the 
best  books  do  not  always  go  off  best.  Inquire  in  seven  years' 
time  for  the  '  Rokebys'  and  the  '  liaras,'  and  where  shall  they 


164  LETTERS    TO    COLERIDGE. 

be  found  ? — fluttering  fragmentally  in  some  thread-paper ; 
whereas  thy  '  Wallenstein'  and  thy  '  Remorse'  are  safe  on 
Longman's  or  Pople's  shelves,  as  in  some  Bodleian,  there 
they  shall  remain  ;  no  need  of  a  chain  to  hold  them  fast — 
perhaps  for  ages — tall  copies — and  people  sha'n't  run  about 
hunting  for  them  as  in  old  Ezra's  shrievalty  they  did  for  a 
Bible,  almost  without  effect,  till  the  great-great-grand-niece 
(by  the  mother's  side)  of  Jeremiah  or  Ezekiel  (which  was 
it?)  remembered  something  of  a  book,  with  odd  reading  in 
it,  that  used  to  lie  in  the  green  closet  in  her  aunt  Judith's  bed- 
chamber. 

"  Thy  caterer,  Price,  was  at  Hamburgh  when  last  Pople 
heard  of  him,  laying  up  for  thee  like  some  miserly  old  father 
for  his  generous-hearted  son  to  squander. 

"  Mr.  Charles  Aders,  whose  books  also  pant  for  that  free 
circulation  which  thy  custody  is  sure  to  give  them,  is  to  be 
heard  of  at  his  kinsmen,  Messrs.  Jameson  and  Aders,  No.  7 
Laurence  Pountney-lane,  London,  according  to  the  informa- 
tion which  Crabius  with  his  parting  breath  left  me.  Crabius 
is  gone  to  Paris.  I  prophesy  he  and  the  Parisians  will  part 
with  mutual  contempt.  His  head  has  a  twist  Allemagne,  like 
thine,  dear  mystic. 

"I  have  been  reading  Madame  Stael  on  Germany.  An  im- 
pudent clever  woman.  But  if  '  Faust'  be  no  better  than  in  her 
abstract  of  it,  I  counsel  thee  to  let  it  alone.  How  canst  thou 
translate  the  language  of  cat-monkeys?  Fy  on  such  fanta- 
sies !  But  I  will  not  forget  to  look  for  Proclus.  It  is  a  kind 
of  book,  when  one  meets  with  it,  one  shuts  the  lid  faster  than 
one  opened  it.  Yet  1  have  some  bastard  kind  of  recollection 
that  somewhere,  some  time  ago,  upon  some  stall  or  other,  I 
saw  it.  It  was  either  that,  or  Plotinus,  or  Saint  Augustine's 
'  City  of  God.'  So  little  do  some  folks  value  what  to  others, 
sc.  to  you,  '  well  used,'  had  been  the  '  Pledge  of  Immortality.' 
Bishop  Bruno  I  never  touched  upon.  Stuffing  too  good  for 
the  brains  of  such  '  a  Hare'  as  thou  describest.  May  it  burst 
his  pericranium,  as  the  gobbets  of  fat  and  turpentine  (a  nasty 
thought  of  the  seer)  did  that  old  dragon  in  the  Apocrypha  ! 
May  he  go  mad  in  trying  to  understand  his  author  !  May  he 
lend  the  third  volume  of  him  before  he  has  quite  translated  the 
second,  to  a  friend  who  shall  lose  it,  and  so  spoil  the  publica- 
tion, and  his  friend  find  it  and  send  it  him  just  as  thou  or  some 
such  less  dilatory  spirit  shall  have  announced  the  whole  for 
the  press ;  lastly,  may  he  be  hunted  by  reviewers,  and  the 
devil  jug  him  !  Canst  think  of  any  other  queries  in  the  solu- 
tion of  which  I  can  give  thee  satisfaction  ?  Do  you  want  any 
books  that  I  can  procure  for  you  ?     Old  Jimmy  Boyer  is  dead 


INTRODUCTION    TO    LAMB.  165 

at  last.  Trollope  has  got  his  living,  worth  1000/.  a  year  nett. 
See,  thou  sluggard,  thou  heretic  sluggard,  what  mightst  thou 
not  have  arrived  at.  Lay  thy  animosity  against  Jimmy  in  the 
grave.     Do  not  entail  it  on  thy  posterity. 

"  Charles  Lamb." 


CHAPTER  X. 

[1815  to  1817.] 
Letters  to  Wordsworth,  Southey,  and  Manning. 

It  was  at  the  beginning  of  the  year  1815  that  I  had  first 
the  happiness  of  a  personal  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Jiamb. 
With  his  scattered  essays  and  poems  I  had  become  famil- 
iar a  few  weeks  before,  through  the  instrumentality  of  Mr. 
Barron  Field,  now  chief-justice  of  Gibraltar,  who  had  been 
brought  into  close  intimacy  with  Lamb  by  the  association  ot 
his  own  family  with  Christ's  Hospital,  of  which  his  father  was 
the  surgeon,  and  by  his  own  participation  in  the  "  Reflector." 
Living  then  in  chambers  in  Inner  Temple-lane,  and  attending 
those  of  Mr.  Chitty,  the  special  pleader,  which  were  on  the 
next  staircase  to  Mr.  Lamb's,  I  had  been  possessed  some 
time  by  a  desire  to  become  acquainted  with  the  writings  ot 
my  gifted  neighbour,  which  my  friend  was  able  only  partially 
to  gratify.  "  John  Woodvil,"  and  the  number  of  the  "  Reflec- 
tor" enriched  with  Lamb's  article,  he  indeed  lent  me,  but  he 
had  no  copy  of  "  Rosamund  Gray,"  which  I  was  most  anxious 
to  read,  and  which,  after  earnest  search  through  all  the  book- 
stalls within  the  scope  of  my  walks,  I  found,  exhibiting  prop- 
er marks  of  due  appreciation,  in  the  store  of  a  little  circula- 
ting library  near  Holborn.  There  was  something  in  this  little 
romance  so  entirely  new,  yet  breathing  the  air  of  old  ac- 
quaintance ;  a  sense  of  beauty  so  delicate  and  so  intense  ;  and 
a  morality  so  benignant  and  so  profound,  that,  as  I  read  it, 
my  curiosity  to  see  its  author  rose  almo.^t  to  the  height  of 
pain.  The  commencement  of  the  new  year  brouglit  me  that 
gratification  ;  I  was  invited  to  meet  Lamb  at  dinner,  at  the 
house  of  Mr.  William  Evans,  a  gentleman  holding  an  ofiice 
in  the  India  House,  who  then  lived  in  Weymou'h-street,  and 
who  was  a  proprietor  of  the  "  Pamphleteer,"  to  which  I  had 
contributod  some  idle  scribblings.  My  duties  at  the  ofiice 
did  not  allow  me  to  avail  myself  of  this  invitation  to  dinner, 


166  INTRODUCTION    TO    LAMB. 

but  I  went  up  at  ten  o'clock,  through  a  deep  snow,  palpably 
congealing  into  ice,  and  was  amply  repaid  when  I  reached 
the  hospitable  abode  of  my  friend.  There  was  Lamb,  pre- 
paring to  depart,  but  he  stayed  half  an  hour  in  kindness  to 
me,  and  then  accompanied  me  to  our  common  home — the 
Temple. 

Methinks  I  see  him  before  me  now,  as  he  appeared  then, 
and  as  he  continued,  with  scarcely  any  perceptible  alteration  to 
me,  during  the  twenty  years  of  intimacy  which  followed,  and 
were  closed  by  his  death.  A  light  frame,  so  fragile  that  it 
seemed  as  if  a  breath  would  overthrow  it,  clad  in  clerklike 
black,  was  surmounted  by  a  head  of  form  and  expression  the 
most  noble  and  sweet.  His  black  hair  curled  crisply  about 
an  expanded  forehead  ;  his  eyes,  softly  brown,  twinkled  with 
varying  expression,  though  the  prevalent  feeling  was  sad  ; 
and  the  nose  slightly  curved,  and  delicately  carved  at  the 
nostril,  with  the  lower  outline  of  the  face  regularly  oval,  com- 
pleted a  head  which  was  finely  placed  on  the  shoulders,  and 
gave  importance,  and  even  dignity,  to  a  diminutive  and  shad- 
owy stem.  Who  shall  describe  his  countenance — catch  its 
quivering  sweetness — and  fix  it  for  ever  in  words  ?  There 
are  none,  alas !  to  answer  the  vain  desire  of  friendship. 
Deep  thought,  striving  with  humour ;  the  lines  of  suffering 
wreathed  into  cordial  mirth  ;  and  a  smile  of  painful  sweetness, 
present  an  image  to  the  mind  it  can  as  little  describe  as  lose. 
His  personal  appearance  and  manner  are  not  unfitly  charac- 
terized by  what  he  himself  says  in  one  of  his  letters  to  Man- 
ning of  Braham — "  a  compound  of  the  Jew,  the  gentleman, 
and  the  angel."  He  took  my  arm,  and  we  walked  to  the 
Temple,  Lamb  stammering  out  fine  remarks  as  we  walked; 
and  when  we  reached  his  staircase,  he  detained  me  with  an 
urgency  which  would  not  be  denied,  and  we  mounted  to  the 
top  story,  where  an  old  petted  servant,  called  Becky,  was 
ready  to  receive  us.  We  were  soon  seated  beside  a  cheer- 
ful fire ;  hot  water  and  its  better  adjuncts  were  before  us  ; 
and  Lamb  insisted  on  my  sitting  with  him  while  he  smoked 
"  one  pipe,"  for — alas  !  for  poor  human  nature — he  had  re- 
sumed his  acquaintance  with  his  "  fair  traitress."  How  often 
the  pipe  and  the  glasses  were  replenished,  I  will  not  under- 
take to  disclose  ;  but  I  can  never  forget  the  conversation  ; 
though  the  first,  it  was  more  solemn  and  in  higher  mood  than 
any  I  ever  after  had  with  Lamb  through  the  whole  of  our 
friendship.  How  it  took  such  a  turn  between  two  strangers, 
one  of  them  a  lad  of  not  quite  twenty,  I  cannot  tell ;  but  so  it 
happened.  We  discoursed  then  of  life  and  death,  and  our 
anticipation  of  a  world  beyond  the  grave.     Lamb  spoke  of 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  167 

these  awful  themes  with  the  simplest  piety,  but  expressed  hia 
own  fond  cleavings  to  life — to  all  well-known  accustomed 
things — and  a  shivering  (not  shuddering)  sense  of  that  which 
is  to  come,  which  he  so  finely  indicated  in  his  "  Newyear's 
Eve"  years  afterward.  It  was  two  o'clock  before  we  parted, 
when  Lamb  gave  me  a  hearty  invitation  to  renew  my  visit  at 
pleasure  ;  but  two  or  three  months  elapsed  before  I  saw  him 
again.  In  the  mean  time,  a  number  of  the  "  Pamphleteer" 
contained  an  "  Essay  on  the  Chief  Living  Poets,"  among 
whom  on  the  title  appeared  the  name  of  Lamb,  and  some 
page  or  two  were  expressly  devoted  to  his  praises.  It  was 
a  poor  tissue  of  tawdry  eulogies — a  shallow  outpouring  of 
young  enthusiasm  in  fine  words,  which  it  mistakes  for  thoughts 
— yet  it  gave  Lamb,  who  had  hitherto  received  scarcely  civil 
notice  from  reviewers,  great  pleasure  to  find  that  any  one 
recognised  him  as  having  a  place  among  poets.  The  next  lime 
I  saw  him,  he  came  almost  breathless  into  the  office,  and  pro- 
posed to  give  me  what  I  should  have  chosen  as  the  greatest 
of  all  possible  honours  and  delights — an  introduction  to  Words- 
worth, who,  I  learned,  with  a  palpitating  heart,  was  actually  at 
the  next  door.  I  hurried  out  with  my  kind  conductor,  and  a 
minute  after  was  presented  by  Lamb  to  the  person  whom  in 
all  the  world  I  venerated  most,  with  this  preface  : — "  Words- 
worth, give  me  leave  to  introduce  to  you  my  only  admirer.*' 

The  following  letter  was  addressed  to  Wordsworth  after 
his  return  to  Westmoreland  from  this  visit: — 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"9th  Aug.,  1815. 
"  Dear  Wordsworth — Mary  and  I  felt  quite  queer  after 
your  taking  leave  (you  W.  W.)  of  us  in  St.  Giles's.  We 
wished  we  had  seen  more  of  you,  but  felt  we  had  scarce  been 
sufficiently  acknowledging  for  the  share  we  had  enjoyed  of 
your  company.  We  felt  as  if  we  had  been  not  enough  ex- 
pressive  of  our  pleasure.  Ikit  our  manners  both  are  a  little 
too  much  on  this  side  of  too-much-cordially.  We  want  pres- 
ence of  mind  and  presence  of  heart.  What  we  feel  comes 
too  late,  like  an  aflcr-thouglit  impromptu.  But  perhaps  you 
observed  nothing  of  that  which  we  liave  been  painfully  con- 
scious of,  and  are  every  day  in  our  intercourse  with  those  wo 
stand  affected  to  through  all  the  degriM^s  of  love.  Robinson 
is  on  the  circuit — our  panegyrist  I  thought  had  forgotten  one 
of  the  objects  of  his  youthful  admiration,  but  I  was  agreeably 
removed  from  that  scruple  by  the  laundress  kiiockin<r  at  my 
door  this  morning,  almost  before  I  was  up,  with  a  present  of 


168  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

fruit  from  my  young  friend,  &;c.  There  is  somethiijg  inex- 
pressibly pleasant  to  me  in  these  presents,  be  it  fruit,  or  fowl,  or 
brawn,  or  lohat  not.  Books  are  a  legitimate  cause  of  accept- 
ance. If  presents  be  not  the  soul  of  friendship,  undoubtedly 
they  are  the  most  spiritual  part  of  the  body  of  that  intercourse. 
There  is  too  much  narrowness  of  thinking  in  this  point.  The 
punctilio  of  acceptance,  methinks,  is  too  confined  and  strait- 
laced.  I  could  be  content  to  receive  money,  or  clothes,  or  a 
joint  of  meat  from  a  friend.  Why  should  he  not  send  me  a 
dinner  as  well  as  a  dessert  ?  I  would  taste  him  in  the  beasts 
of  the  field,  and  through  all  creation.  Therefore  did  the  bas- 
ket of  fruit  of  the  juvenile  Talfourd  not  displease  me  ;  not  that 
I  have  any  thoughts  of  bartering  or  reciprocating  these  things. 
To  send  him  anything  in  return  would  be  to  reflect  suspicion 
of  mercinariness  upon  what  I  know  he  meant  a  free-will  of- 
fering. Let  him  overcome  me  in  bounty.  In  this  strife  a 
generous  nature  loves  to  be  overcome.  You  wish  me  some 
of  your  leisure.  I  have  a  glimmering  aspect,  a  chink-light  of 
liberty  before  me,  which,  I  pray  God,  prove  not  fallacious. 
My  remonstrances  have  stirred  up  others  to  remonstrate,  and, 
altogether,  there  is  a  plan  for  separating  certain  parts  of  busi- 
ness from  our  department ;  which,  if  it  take  place,  will  pro- 
duce me  more  time,  i.  e.,  my  evenings  free.  It  may  be  a 
means  of  placing  me  in  a  more  conspicuous  situation,  which 
will  knock  at  my  nerves  another  way,  but  I  wait  the  issue  in 
submission.  If  I  can  but  begin  my  own  day  at  four  o'clock  in 
the  afternoon,  I  shall  think  myself  to  have  Eden  days  of  peace 
and  liberty  to  what  I  have  had.  As  you  say,  how  a  man  can 
fill  three  volumes  up  with  an  essay  on  the  drama  is  wonder- 
ful ;  1  am  sure  a  very  few  sheets  would  hold  all  I  had  to  say 

on  the  subject. 

****** 

Did  you  ever  read  '  Charon  on  Wisdom  V  or  '  Patrick's  Pil- 
grim V  If  neither,  you  have  two  great  pleasures  to  come.  I 
mean  some  day  to  attack  Caryl  on  Job,  six  folios.  What  any 
man  can  write,  surely  I  may  read.  If  I  do  but  get  rid  of  au- 
diting warehouse-keeper's  accounts,  and  get  no  worse-haras- 
sing task  in  the  place  of  it,  what  a  lord  of  liberty  I  shall  be  ! 
I  shall  dance,  and  skip,  and  make  mouths  at  the  invisible 
event,  and  pick  the  thorns  out  of  my  pillow,  and  throw  *em  at 
rich  men's  nightcaps,  and  talk  blank  verse,  hoity,  toity,  and 
sing — '  A  clerk  I  was  in  London  gay,'  '  Ban,  ban,  Ca-Caliban,' 
like  the  emancipated  monster,  and  go  where  I  like,  up  this 
street  or  down  that  alley.  Adieu,  and  pray  that  it  may  be  my 
luck. 

"  Good-by  to  you  all.  C.  Lamb." 


,         LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY,  169 

The  following  letter  was  enclosed  in  the  same  parcel  with 
the  last. 

TO    MR.    SOrTHEY. 

'■  1815. 

"  Dear  Southey — Robinson  is  not  on  the  circuit,  as  I  erro- 
neously stated  in  a  letter  to  W.  W.,  which  travels  with  this 
but  is  gone  to  Brussels,  Ostend,  Ghent,  &c.     But  his  friends 
the  Colliers,  whom  I  consulted  respecting  your  friend's  fate 
remember  to  have  heard  him  say  that  Father  Pardo  had  ef- 
fected his  escape  (the  cunning  greasy  rogue),  and,  to  the  best 
of  their  belief,  is  at  present  in  Paris.     To  my  thinking,  it  is  a 
small  matter  whether  there  be  one  fat  friar  more  or  less  in  the 
world.      I  have  rather  a  taste  for  clerical  executions,  imbibed 
from  early  recollections  of  the  fate  of  the  excellent  Dodd.     I 
hear  Bonaparte  has  sued  his  habeas  corpus,  and  the  twelve 
judges  are  now  sitting  upon  it  at  the  Rolls. 

"  Your  boute-feu  (bonfire)  must  be  excellent  of  its  kind. 
Poet  Settle  presided  at  the  last  great  thing  of  the  kind  in  Lon- 
don, when  the  pope  was  burnt  in  form.  Do  you  provide  any 
verses  on  this  occasion  ?  Your  fear  for  Hartley's  intellectuals 
is  just  and  rational.  Could  not  the  chancellor  be  petitioned 
to  remove  him  ?  His  lordship  took  Mr.  Betty  from  under  the 
paternal  wing.  I  think,  at  least,  he  should  go  through  a  course 
of  matter-of-fact  with  some  sober  man  after  the  mysteries. 
Could  not  he  spend  a  week  at  Poole's  before  he  goes  back  to 
Oxford  ?  Tobin  is  dead.  But  there  is  a  man  in  my  office,  a 
Mr.  H.,  wlio  proses  it  away  from  morning  to  night,  and  never 
gets  beyond  corporeal  and  material  verities.  He'd  get  these 
crack-brain  metaphysics  out  of  the  young  gentleman's  head 
as  soon  as  any  one  I  know.  When  1  can't  sleep  o'  nights,  1 
imagine  a  dialogue  with  Mr.  H.  upon  any  given  subject,  and 
go  prosing  on  in  fancy  with  him,  till  1  either  laugh  or  fall  asleep. 
1  have  literally  found  it  answer.  I  am  going  to  stand  god- 
father;  I  don't  like  the  business;  I  cannot  muster  up  decorum 
for  these  occasions  ;  I  shall  certainly  disgrace  the  font.  I 
was  at  Hazliit's  marriage,  and  had  like  to  have  been  turned 
out  several  times  during  the  ceremony.  Anything  awful 
makes  me  laugh.  I  misbehaved  once  at  a  funeral.  Yet  I 
can  read  about  these  ceremonies  with  pious  and  proper  feel- 
ings. 'J'he  realities  of  life  only  seem  the  mockeries.  I  fear 
I  must  get  cured  along  with  Hartley,  if  not  too  inveterate. 
Don't  you  think  Louis  the  Desirable  is  in  a  sort  of  quandary  ? 

**  After  all,  Bonaparte  is  a  fine  fellow,  as  my  barber  says, 
and  I  should  not  mind  standing  bareheaded  at  his  table  to  do 
him  service  in  his  fall.     They  should  have  given  him  Hamp- 

VoL  L— 15  H 


170  LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.      • 

ton  Court  or  Kensington,  with  a  tether  extending  forty  miles 
round  London.  Qu.  Would  not  the  people  have  ejected  the 
Bruns wicks  some  day  in  his  favour  ?     Well,  we  shall  see. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  following  was  addressed  to  Southey  in  acknowledg- 
ment of  his  "  Roderick,"  the  most  sustained  and  noble  of  his 
poems. 

TO    MR.    SOrTHEY. 

"  Dear  Southey — T  have  received  from  Longman  a  copy  of 

*  Roderick,'  with  the  author's  compliments,  for  which  I  much 
thank  you.  1  don't  know  where  I  shall  put  all  the  noble  pres- 
ents I  have  lately  received  in  that  way  ;  the  '  Excursion,' 
Wordsworth's  two  last  vols.,  and  now  '  Roderick,'  have  come 
pouring  in  upon  me  like  some  irruption  from  Helicon.  The 
story  of  the  brave  Maccabee  was  already,  you  may  be  sure, 
familiar  to  me  in  all  its  parts.  I  have,  since  the  receipt  of 
your  present,  read  it  quite  through  again,  and  with  no  dimin- 
ished pleasure.  I  don't  know  whether  I  ought  to  say  that  it 
has  given  me   more  pleasure  than  any  of  your  long  poems. 

*  Kehama'  is  doubtless  more  powerful,  but  I  don't  feel  that  firm 
footing  in  it  that  I  do  in  'Roderick;'  my  imagination  goes 
sinking  and  floundering  in  the  vast  spaces  of  unopened-before 
systems  and  faiths  ;  I  am  put  out  of  the  pale  of  my  old  sym- 
pathies ;  my  moral  sense  is  almost  outraged  ;  I  can't  believe, 
or  with  horror  am  made  to  believe,  such  desperate  chances 
against  omnipotences,  such  disturbances  of  faith  to  the  centre  ; 
the  more  potent  the  more  painful  the  spell.  Jove,  and  his 
brotherhood  of  gods,  tottering  with  the  giant  assailings,  I  can 
bear,  for  the  soul's  hopes  are  not  struck  at  in  such  contests  ; 
but  your  oriental  almighties  are  too  much  types  of  the  intan- 
gible prototype  to  be  meddled  with  without  shuddering.  One 
never  connects  what  are  called  the  attributes  with  Jupiter.  1 
mention  only  what  diminishes  my  delight  at  the  wonder-work- 
ings of  '  Kehama,'  not  what  impeaches  its  power,  which  I  con- 
fess with  trembling  ;  but '  Roderick'  is  a  comfortable  poem.  It 
reminds  me  of  the  delight  I  took  in  the  first  reading  of  the  '  Joan 
of  Arc'  It  is  maturer  and  better  than  that^  though  not  better 
to  me  now  than  that  was  then.  It  suits  me  better  than  Ma- 
doc.  I  am  at  home  in  Spain  and  Christendom.  I  have  a 
timid  imagination,  I  am  afraid.  I  do  not  willingly  admit  of 
strange  beliefs,  or  out-of-the-way  creeds  or  places.  I  never 
read  books  of  travels,  at  least  not  farther  than  Paris  or  Rome. 
I  can  just  endure  Moors,  because  Qf  their  connexion  as  foes 
with  Christians ;  but  Abyssinians,  Ethiops,  Esquimaux,  Der- 


LETTERS    TO    SOUTHEY.  171 

vises,  and  all  that  tribe,  I  hate.  I  believe  I  fear  them  in  some 
manner.  A  Mohammedan  turban  on  the  stage,  though  envelop- 
ing some  well-known  face  (Mr.  Cook  or  Mr.  Maddox,  whom  I 
see  another  day  good  Christian  and  English  waiters,  inn-keep- 
ers, (fcc),  does  not  give  me  pleasure  unalloyed.  I  am  a  Chris- 
tian, Englishman,  Londoner,  Templar.  God  help  me,  when  [ 
come  to  put  off  these  snug  relations,  and  to  get  abroad  into 
the  world  to  come  !  I  shall  be  like  the  crow  on  the  sand,  as 
Wordsworth  has  it  ;  but  I  won't  think  on  it ;  no  need,  1  hope, 
yet. 

"  The  parts  I  have  been  most  pleased  with,  both  on  first 
and  second  readings,  perhaps  are  Florinda's  palliation  of  Rod- 
erick's crime,  confessed  to  him  in  his  disguise — the  retreat  of 
the  Palayos  family  first  discovered — his  being  made  king — 
'  For  acclamation  one  form  must  serve,  more  solemn  for  the 
breach  of  old  observances.''  Roderick's  vow  is  extremely  fine, 
and  his  blessing  on  the  vow  of  Alphonso : 

'  Towards  the  troop  he  spread  his  arms, 
As  if  the  expanded  soul  diffused  itself, 
And  carried  to  all  spirits  wilh  the  act 
Its  affluent  inspiration.' 

"  It  Struck  me  forcibly  that  the  feeling  of  these  last  lines 
might  have  been  suggested  to  you  by  the  Cartoon  of  Paul  at 
Athens.  Certain  it  is  that  a  better  motto  or  guide  to  that  fa- 
mous attitude  can  nowhere  be  found.  I  shall  adopt  it  as  ex- 
planatory of  that  violent  but  dignified  motion.  I  must  read 
again  Landor's  'Julian.'  I  have  not  read  it  some  time.  I 
think  he  must  have  failed  in  Roderick,  for  I  remember  nothing 
of  him,  nor  of  any  distinct  character  as  a  character — only  fine- 
sounding  passages.  1  remember  thinking  also  he  had  chosen 
a  point  of  time  after  the  event,  as  it  were,  for  Roderick  sur- 
vives to  no  use  ;  but  my  memory  is  weak,  and  I  will  not 
wrong  a  fine  poem  by  trusting  to  it.  The  notes  to  your  poem 
I  have  not  read  again  ;  but  it  will  be  a  take-downable  book 
on  my  shelf,  and  they  will  serve  sometimes  at  breakfast,  or 
times  too  light  for  the  text  to  be  duly  appreciated.  'I'hough 
some  of 'em,  one  of  the  serpent  penance,  is  serious  enough, 
now  I  think  on'l.  Of  Coleridge  I  hear  noihing,  nor  of  the 
Morgans.  I  hope  to  have  him,  like  a  reappearing  star,  stand- 
ing up  before  me  some  time  when  least  expected  in  London, 
as  has  been  the  case  whylear. 

**  I  am  doing  nothing  (as  the  plirase  is)  but  reading  pres- 
ents, and  walk  away  what  of  the  day-hours  I  can  get  from 
hard  occupation.  Pray  accept  once  more  my  hearty  thanks 
and  expression  of  pleasure  for  your  remembrance  of  mc.     My 

H2 


172  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

Sister  desires  her  kind  respects  to  Mrs.  S.  and  to  all  at  Kes- 
wick. 

"  Yours  truly, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"  London,  6th  May,  1815 

"  The  next  present  I  look  for  is  the  *  White  Doe.'  Have 
you  seen  Mat.  Bentham's  '  Lay  of  Marie  V  I  think  it  very 
delicately  pretty  as  to  sentiment,  &;c." 

The  following  is  an  extract  of  a  letter  addressed  shortly 
afterward 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"  Since  I  saw  you  I  have  had  a  treat  in  the  reading  way 
which  comes  not  every  day  ;  the  Latin  poems  of  Vincent 
Bourne,  which  were  quite  new  to  me.  What  a  heart  that 
man  had,  all  laid  out  upon  town-scenes,  a  proper  counterpart 
to  some  people's  extravagances.  Why  I  mention  him  is,  that 
yoHr  '  Power  of  Music'  reminded  me  of  his  poem  of  the  bal- 
lad-singer in  the  Seven  Dials.  Do  you  remember  his  epi- 
gram on  the  old  woman  who  taught  Newton  the  A,  B,  C, 
which,  after  all,  he  says,  he  hesitates  not  to  call  Newton's 
Principia  1 

"  I  was  lately  fatiguing  myself  with  going  over  a  volume  of 

fine  words  by ,  excellent  words  ;  and  if  the  heart  could 

live  by  words  alone,  it  could  desire  no  better  regale  ;  but  what 
an  aching  vacuum  of  matter  !  I  don't  stick  at  the  madness  of 
it,  for  that  is  only  a  consequence  of  shutting  his  eyes,  and 
thinking  he  is  in  the  age  of  the  old  Elizabeth  poets.  From 
thence  I  turned  to  V.  Bourne  ;  what  a  sweet,  unpretending, 
pretty-mannered,  matter-full  creature  !  sucking  from  every 
flower,  making  a  flower  of  everything.  His  diction  all  Latin, 
and  his  thoughts  all  English.  Bless  him  !  Latin  wasn't  good 
enough  for  him.  Why  wasn't  he  content  with  the  language 
which  Gay  and  Prior  wrote  in  ?" 

The  associations  of  Christmas  increased  the  fervour  of 
Lamb's  wishes  for  Manning's  return,  which  he  now  really 
hoped  for.  On  Christmas-day  he  addressed  a  letter  to  him  at 
Canton,  and  the  next  day  another  to  meet  him  half  way  home, 
at  St.  Helena,  &lc.  There  seems  the  distance  of  half  a  globe 
between  these  letters.  The  first,  in  which  Lamb  pictures  their 
dearest  common  friends  as  in  a  melancholy  future,  and  makes 
it  present — lying  like  dismal  truths — yet  with  a  relieving  con- 
sciousness of  a  power  to  dispel  the  sad  enchantments  he  has 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING,  173 

woven,  has  perhaps  more  of  what  was  peculiar  in  Lamb's  cast 
of  thought  than  anything  of  the  same  length  which  he  has 
left  us. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Dear  old  friend  and  absentee — This  is  Christmas-day, 
1815,  with  us;  what  it  may  be  with  you  I  don't  know,  the 
12th  of  June  next  year,  perhaps  ;  and  if  it  should  be  ihe  con- 
secrated season  with  you,  I  don't  see  how  you  can  keep  it. 
You  have  no  turkeys  ;  you  would  not  desecrate  the  festival  by 
offering  up  a  withered  Chinese  bantam  instead  of  the  savoury 
grand  Norfolcian  holocaust,  that  smokes  all  around  my  nos- 
trils at  this  moment  from  a  thousand  firesides.  Then  what 
puddings  have  you?  Where  will  you  get  holly  to  stick  in 
your  churches,  or  churches  to  stick  your  dried  tea-leaves  (that 
must  be  the  substitute)  in  ?  What  memorials  you  can  have 
of  the  holy  time,  I  see  not.  A  chopped  missionary  or  two 
may  keep  up  the  thin  idea  of  Lent  and  the  wilderness  ;  but 
what  standing  evidences  have  you  of  the  Nativity  ?  'tis  our 
rosy-cheeked,  homestalled  divines,  whose  faces  shine  to  the 
tune  of  Christmas  ;  faces  fragrant  with  the  mince-pies  of  half 
a  century,  that  alone  can  authenticate  the  cheerful  mystery — 
I  feel,  I  feel  myself  refreshed  with  the  thought — my  zeal  is 
great  against  the  unedified  heathen.  Down  with  the  pagodas — 
down  with  the  idols — Ching-chong-fo — and  his  foolish  priest- 
hood !  Come  out  of  Babylon,  oh  my  friend  !  for  her  time  is 
come,  and  the  child  that  is  native,  and  the  proselyte  of  her 
gates,  shall  kindle  and  smoke  together!  And,  in  sober  sense, 
what  makes  you  so  long  from  among  us,  Manning  ?  You  must 
aot  expect  to  see  the  same  England  again  which  you  left. 

"  Empires  have  been  overturned,  crowns  trodden  inio  dust, 
the  face  of  the  western  world  quite  changed  ;  your  friends 
have  all  got  old — those  you  left  blooming — myself  (who  am  one 
of  the  few  that  remember  you) — those  golden  hairs  which  you 
recollect  my  taking  a  pride  in,  turned  to  silvery  and  gray. 
Mary  has  been  dead  and  buried  many  years  ;  she  desired  to 
be  buried  in  the  silk  gown  you  sent  her.  Rickman,  that  you 
remember  active  and  strong,  now  walks  out  supported  by  a  ser- 
vant-maid and  a  stick.  Martin  IJurney  is  a  very  old  man.  The 
other  day  an  aged  woman  knocked  at  my  door,  aud  pretended 
to  my  acquaintance  ;  it  was  long  before  I  had  the  most  dis- 
tant cognition  of  her ;  but  at  last,  together,  we  made  lier  out 
to  be  Louisa,  the  daughter  of  Mrs.  Topham,  formerly  Mrs. 
Morton,  who  had  been  Mrs.  Reynolds,  formerly  Mrs.  Kenny, 
whose  first  husband  was  Ilolcroft,  the.  dramatic  writer  of  the 
last  century.  St.  Paul's  church  is  aheap  of  ruins  ;  the  Mon- 
15* 


174  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

ument  is  not  half  so  high  as  you  knew  it,  divers  parts  being 
successively  taken  down,  which  the  ravages  of  time  had  ren- 
dered dangerous ;  the  horse  at  Charing  Cross  is  gone,  no  one 
knows  whither ;  and  all  this  has  taken  place  while  you  have 
been  settling   whether  Ho-hing-tong  should  be  spelled  with 

a or  a .     For  aught  1  see,  you  had  almost  as  well 

remain  where  you  are,  and  not  come  like  a  Strulbug  into  a 
world  where  few  were  born  when  you  went  away.  Scarce 
here  and  there  one  will  be  able  to  make  out  your  face  ;  all 
your  opinions  will  be  out  of  date,  your  jokes  obsolete,  your 
puns  rejected  with  fastidiousness  as  wit  of  the  last  age.  Your 
way  of  mathematics  has  already  given  way  to  a  new  method, 
which,  after  all,  is,  I  believe,  the  old  doctrine  of  Maclaurin,  new 
vamped  up  with  what  he  borrowed  of  the  negative  quantity  of 
fluxions  from  Euler. 

"  Poor  Godwin  !    I  was  passing  his  tomb  the  other  day  iu 
Cripplegate    churchyard.      There   are  some    verses   upon   it 

written  by   Miss  ,  which,  if  I  thought  good   enough,  I 

would  send  you.  He  was  one  of  those  who  would  have 
hailed  your  return,  not  with  boisterous  shouts  and  clamours, 
but  with  the  complacent  gratulations  of  a  philosopher  anxious 
to  promote  knowledge  as  leading  to  happiness — but  his  sys- 
tems and  his  theories  are  ten  feet  deep  in  Cripplegate  mould. 
Coleridge  is  just  dead,  having  lived  just  long  enough  to  close 
the  eyes  of  Wordsworth,  who  paid  the  debt  to  nature  but  a 
week  or  two  before — poor  Col.,  but  two  days  before  he  died, 
he  wrote  to  a  bookseller  proposing  an  epic  poem  on  the 
'  Wanderings  of  Cain,'  in  twenty-four  books.  It  is  said  he 
has  left  behind  him  more  than  forty  thousand  treatises  in  crit- 
icism, metaphysics,  and  divinity,  but  few  of  them  in  a  state  of 
completion.  They  are  now  destined,  perhaps,  to  wrap  up 
spices.  You  see  what  mutations  the  busy  hand  of  Time  has 
produced,  while  you  have  consumed  in  foolish  voluntary  exile 
that  lime  which  might  have  gladdened  your  friends,  benefited 
your  country  ;  but  reproaches  are  useless.  Gather  up  the 
wretched  relics,  my  friend,  as  fast  as  you  can,  and  come  to 
your  old  home.  I  will  rub  my  eyes  and  try  to  recognise  you. 
We  will  shake  withered  hands  together,  and  talk  of  old  things 
— of  St.  Mary's  church  and  the  barber's  opposite,  where  the 
young  students  in  mathematics  used  to  assemble.  Poor  Crips, 
that  kef)t  it  afterward,  set  up  a  fruiterer's  shop  in  Trumping- 
ton-street,  and,  for  aught  I  know,  resides  there  still,  for  I  saw 
the  name  up  in  the  last  journey  I  took  there  with  my  sister, 
just  before  she  died.  I  suppose  you  heard  that  I  had  left  the 
India  House,  and  gone  into  the  Fishmonger's  Almshouses 
over  the  bridge.     I  have  a  little  cabin  there,  small  and  home- 


LETTERS    TO    MANNING.  175 

ly,  but  you  shall  be  welcome  to  it.     You  like  oysters,  and  to 
open  them  yourself;  I'll  get  you  some  if  you  come  in  oyster- 
time.      Marshall,  Godwin's  friend,  is  still  alive,  and   talks  of 
the  faces  you  used  to  make. 
"  Come  as  soon  as  you  can, 

»*  C.  Lamb." 

Here  is  the  next  day's  reverse  of  the  picture. 

TO    MR.    MANNING. 

"  Dec.  26,  1815. 
"  Dear  Manning — Following  your  brother's  example,  I  have 
just  ventured  one  letter  to  Canton,  and  am  now  hazarding  anoth- 
er (not  exactly  a  duplicate)  to  St.  Helena.  The  first  was  full 
of  unprobable  romantic  fictions,  fitting  the  remoteness  of  the 
mission  it  goes  upon ;  in  the  present  I  mean  to  confine  my- 
self nearer  to  truth  as  you  come  nearer  home.  A  corre- 
spondence with  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth  necessarily  in- 
volves in  it  some  heat  of  fancy  ;  it  sets  the  brain  a  going  ;  but 
I  can  think  on  the  half-way  house  tranquilly.  Your  friends, 
then,  are  not  all  dead  or  grown  forgetful  of  you  through  old 
age,  as  that  lying  letter  asserted,  anticipating  rather  what 
must  happen  if  you  kept  tarrying  on  for  ever  on  the  skirts  of 
creation,  as  there  seemed  a  danger  of  your  doing  ;  but  they 
are  all  tolerably  well  and  in  full  and  perfect  comprehension 
of  what  is   meant  by  Manning's  coming   home  again.      Mrs. 

never  lets  her  tongue  run  riot  more  than  in  remembrances 

of  you.  Fanny  expends  herself  in  phrases  that  can  only  be 
justified  by  her  romantic  nature.  Mary  reserves  a  portion  of 
your  silk,  not  to  be  buried  in  (as  the  false  nuncio  asserts),  but 
to  make  up  spick  and  span  into  a  bran-new  gown  to  wear 
when  you  come.  I  am  the  same  as  when  you  knew  me,  al- 
most to  a  surfeiting  identity.  This  very  night  I  am  going  to 
leave  off  tiibacco  !  Surely  in  another  world  this  unconquerable 
purpose  shall  be  realized.  The  soul  hath  not  her  generous 
aspirings  implanted  in  her  in  vain.  One  that  you  knew,  and, 
I  think,  the  only  one  of  those  friends  we  knew  much  of  in 
common,  has  died  in  earnest.  Poor  Priscilla  !  Her  brother 
Robert  is  also  dead,  and  several  of  the  grown-up  brothers  and 
sisters,  in  the  compass  of  a  very  few  years.  Death  has  not 
otherwise  meddled  much  in  families  that  I  know.  Not  but 
he  has  his  horrid  eye  upon  us,  and  is  whetting  his  infernal 
feathered  dart  every  instant,  as  you  see  him  truly  pictured  in 
that  impressive  moral  picture,  *  The  good  man  at  the  hour  of 
death.'  I  have  in  trust  to  put  in  the  post  four  letters  from  Diss, 
and  one  from  Lynn,  to  St.  Helena,  which,  I  hope,  will  accom- 


176  LETTERS    TO    MANNING. 

pany  this  safe,  and  one  from  Lynn,  and  the  one  before  spoken 
of  from  me,  to  Canton.  But  we  all  hope  that  these  letters 
may  be  waste  paper.  I  don't  know  why  I  have  forborne  wri- 
ting so  long.  But  it  is  such  a  forlorn  hope  to  send  a  scrap  of 
paper  straggling  over  wide  oceans.  And  yet  I  know,  when  you 
come  home,  I  shall  have  you  sitting  before  me  at  our  fireside 
just  as  if  you  had  never  been  away.  In  such  an  instant  does  the 
return  of  a  person  dissipate  all  the  weight  of  imaginary  per- 
plexity from  distance  of  time  and  space  ?  I'll  promise  you 
good  oysters.  Cory  is  dead  that  kept  the  shop  opposite  St. 
Dunstan's,  but  the  tougher  materials  of  the  shop  survive  the 
perishing  fame  of  its  keeper.  Oysters  continue  to  flourish 
under  as  good  auspices.  Poor  Cory !  But  if  you  will  ab- 
sent yourself  twenty  years  together,  you  must  not  expect 
numerically  the  same  population  to  congratulate  your  return 
which  wetted  the  seabeach  with  their  tears  when  you  went 
away.  Have  you  recovered  the  breathless  stone-staring  as- 
tonishment into  which  you  must  have  been  thrown  upon  learn- 
ing, at  landing,  that  an  Emperor  of  France  was  living  in  St. 
Helena  ?  What  an  event  in  the  solitude  of  the  seas,  like  find- 
ing a  fish's  bone  at  the  top  of  Plinlimmon ;  but  these  things 
are  nothing  in  our  western  world.  Novelties  cease  to  affect. 
Come  and  try  what  your  presence  can. 

"  God  bless  you.     Your  old  friend, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  years  which  Lamb  passed  in  his  chambers  in  Inner 
Temple-lane  were,  perhaps,  the  happiest  of  his  life.  His 
salary  was  considerably  augmented,  his  fame  as  an  author 
was  rapidly  extending ;  he  resided  near  the  spot  which  he 
best  loved,  and  was  surrounded  by  a  motley  group  of  attached 
friends,  some  of  them  men  of  rarest  parts,  and  all  strongly  at- 
tached to  him  and  to  his  sister.  Here  the  glory  of  his  Wed- 
nesday nights  shone  forth  in  its  greatest  lustre.  If  you  did 
not  meet  there  the  favourites  of  fortune,  authors  whose  works 
bore  the  highest  price  in  Paternoster  Row,  and  who  glittered 
in  the  circles  of  fashion,  you  might  find  those  who  had 
thought  most  deeply,  felt  most  keenly,  and  were  destined  to 
produce  the  most  lasting  influences  on  the  literature  and  man- 
ners of  the  age.  There  Hazlitt,  sometimes  kindling  into 
fierce  passion  at  any  mention  of  the  great  reverses  of  his  idol 
Napoleon,  at  other  times  bashfully  enunciated  the  finest  criti- 
cism on  art,  or  dwelt  with  genial  iteration  on  a  passage  in 
Chaucer ;  or,  fresh  from  the  theatre,  expatiated  on  some  new 
instance  of  energy  in  Kean,  or  reluctantly  conceded  a  great- 
ness to  Kemble,  or  detected  some  popular  fallacy  with  the 


Coleridge's  discourse.  177 

fairest  and  the  subtlest  reasoning.  There  Godwin,  as  he 
played  his  quiet  rubber,  or  benignantly  joined  in  the  gossip  of 
the  day,  sat  an  object  of  curiosity  and  wonder  to  the  stranger, 
who  had  been  at  one  time  shocked  or  charmed  with  his  high 
speculation,  and  at  another  awestruck  by  the  force  and  graphic 
power  of  his  novels.  There  Coleridge  sometimes,  though 
rarely,  took  his  seat ;  and  then  the  genial  hubbub  of  voices 
was  still;  critics,  philosophers,  and  poets  were  contented  to 
listen  ;  and  toilworn  lawyers,  clerks  from  the  India  House, 
and  members  of  the  Stock  Exchange,  grew  romantic  while  he 
spoke.  Lamb  used  to  say  that  he  was  inferior  then  to  what 
he  had  been  in  his  youth;  but  lean  scarcely  believe  it;  at 
least  there  is  nothing  in  his  early  writing  which  gives  any 
idea  of  the  richness  of  his  mind  so  lavishly  poured  out  at  this 
time  in  his  happiest  moods.  Although  he  looked  much  older 
than  he  was,  his  hair  being  silvered  all  over,  and  his  person 
tending  to  corpulency,  there  was  about  him  no  trace  of  bodily 
sickness  or  mental  decay,  but  rather  an  air  of  voluptuous  re- 
pose. His  benignity  of  manner  placed  his  auditors  entirely 
at  their  ease,  and  inclined  them  to  listen  delighted  to  the  sweet, 
low  tone  in  which  he  began  to  discourse  on  some  high  theme. 
Whether  he  had  won  for  his  greedy  listener  only  some  raw 
lad,  or  charmed  a  circle  of  beauty,  rank,  and  wit,  who  hung 
breathless  on  his  words,  he  talked  with  equal  eloquence  ;  for 
his  subject,  not  his  audience,  inspired  him.  At  first  his  tones 
were  conversational ;  he  seemed  to  dally  with  the  shallows  of 
the  subject  and  with  fantastic  images  which  bordered  it ;  but 
gradually  the  thought  grew  deeper,  and  the  voice  deepened 
with  the  thought;  the  stream,  gathering  strength,  seemed  to 
bear  along  with  it  all  things  which  opposed  its  progress,  and 
blended  them  with  its  current ;  and,  stretching  away  among 
regions  tinted  with  ethereal  colours,  was  lost  at  airy  distance 
in  the  horizon  of  fancy.  His  hearers  were  unable  to  grasp 
his  theories,  which  were,  indeed,  too  vast  to  be  exhibited  in  the 
longest  conversation  :  but  they  perceived  noble  images,  gen- 
erous suggestions,  aflecling  pictures  of  virtue,  which  enriched 
their  minds  and  nurtured  their  best  aflections.  Coli>ridge  was 
sometimes  induced  to  recite  portions  of  "  Christabel,"'  then 
enshrined  in  manuscript  from  eyes  profane,  and  gave  a  be- 
witching eilect  to  its  wizard  lines  But  more  peculiar  in  its 
beauty  than  liiis  was  his  recitation  of  Kubla  Khan.  As  he 
repeated  the  passage — 

A  dnnisrl  with  a  dulcimer 
In  a  vision  once  1  saw  : 

It  was  an  Abyssinian  maid, 
And  on  her  dulcimRr  she  played, 
Singing  of  Mont  Abora  ' 
113 


178  Coleridge's  discourse. 

his  voice  seemed  to  mount  and  melt  into  air  as  the  images 
grew  more  visionary,  and  the  suggested  associations  more  re- 
mote. He  usually  met  opposition  by  conceding  the  point  to 
the  objector,  and  then  went  on  with  his  high  argument  as  if  it 
had  never  been  raised  :  thus  satisfying  his  antagonist,  him- 
self, and  all  who  heard  him  ;  none  of  whom  desired  to  hear 
his  discourse  frittered  into  points,  or  displaced  by  the  near  en- 
counter even  of  the  most  brilliant  wits.  The  first  time  I  met 
him,  which  was  on  one  of  those  Wednesday  evenings,  we 
left  the  party  together  between  one  and  two  in  the  morning ; 
Coleridge  took  my  arm,  and  led  me,  nothing  loath,  at  a  very 
gentle  pace,  to  his  lodgings,  at  the  Gloucester  Coffee-house, 
pouring  into  my  ear  the  whole  way  an  argument  by  which  he 
sought  to  reconcile  the  doctrines  of  Necessity  and  Free-will, 
winding  on  through  a  golden  maze  of  exquisite  illustration  ; 
but  finding  no  end,  except  with  the  termination  of  that  (to  me) 
enchanted  walk.  He  was  only  then  on  the  threshold  of  the 
Temple  of  Truth,  into  which  his  genius  darted  its  quivering  and 
uncertain  rays,  but  which  he  promised  shortly  to  light  up  with 
unbroken  lustre.  "  I  understood  a  beauty  in  the  words,  but  not 
the  words  :" 

"  And  when  the  stream  of  sound, 
Which  overflow'd  the  soul,  had  pass'd  away, 
A  consciousness  survived  that  it  had  left, 
Deposited  upon  the  silent  shore 
Of  memory,  images  and  gentle  thoughts, 
Which  cannot  die,  and  will  not  be  destroy'd." 

Men  of  "  great  mark  and  likelihood"  attended  those  delight- 
ful suppers,  where  the  utmost  freedom  prevailed — including 
politicians  of  every  grade,  from  Godwin  up  to  the  editor  of  the 
"  New  Times." 

Hazlitt  has  alluded  con  amove  to  these  meetings  in  his  Es- 
say "  On  the  Conversation  of  Authors,"  and  has  reported  one 
of  the  most  remarkable  discussions  which  graced  them  in  his 
Essay  "  On  Persons  one  would  wish  to  have  seen,"  published 
by  his  son,  in  the  two  volumes  of  his  remains,  which  with  so 
affectionate  a  care  he  has  given  to  the  world.  In  this  was  a 
fine  touch  of  Lamb's  pious  feeling,  breaking  through  his  fan- 
cies and  his  humours,  which  Hazlitt  has  recorded,  but  which 
cannot  be  duly  appreciated  except  by  those  who  can  recall  to 
memory  the  suffused  eye  and  quivering  lip  with  which  he 
stammered  out  a  reference  to  the  name  which  he  would  not 
utter.  *'  There  is  only  one  other  person  1  can  ever  think  of 
after  this,"  said  he.  "  If  Shakspeare  was  to  come  into  the 
room,  we  should  all  rise  to  meet  him ;  but  if  That  Person 
were  to  come  into  it,  we  should  all  fall  down  and  kiss  the 
hem  of  his  garment." 


EPISTLE    TO    AYRTON.  179 

Among  the  frequent  guests  in  Inner  Temple-lane  was  Mr. 
Ayrton,  the  director  of  the  music  at  the  Italian  Opera.  To 
him  Lamb  addressed  the  following  rhymed  epistle  on  17th 
May,  1817. 

TO  WILLIAM  AYRTON,  ESQ. 

My  dear  friend, 
Before  I  end, 
Have  you  any 
More  orders  for  Don  Giovanni, 
To  give 
Him  thai  doth  live 
Your  faithful  Zany? 

Without  raillery, 
I  mean  Gallery 
Ones : 
For  I  am  a  person  that  shuns 
All  ostentation, 
And  being  at  the  top  of  the  fashion ; 
And  seldom  go  to  operas. 
But  m  forma  pauperis  ! 

I  go  to  the  play 
In  a  very  economical  sort  of  a  way, 
Rather  to  see 
Than  be  seen  ; 
Though  I'm  no  ill  sight 
Neither, 
By  candlelight. 
And  in  some  kinds  of  weather. 
You  might  pit  me 

For  height 
Against  Kean ; 
But  in  a  grand  tragic  scene 
I'm  nothing : 
It  would  create  a  kmd  of  loathing 
To  see  me  act  Hamlet ; 
There'd  be  many  a  damn  let 

Fly 
At  my  presumption, 
If  I  should  try, 
Being  a  fellow  of  no  gumption. 

By-the-way,  tell  me  candidly  how  you  relish 
This,  which  they  call 
The  lapidary  style  ? 

Opinions  vary. 
The  laie  Mr.  Mel'lish 
Could  never  abide  it ; 

He  thought  it  vile,  , 

And  coxcombical. 
My  friend  the  port-laureate, 
Who  is  a  great  lawyer  at 

Anything  comical, 
Was  the  first  who  tried  it ; 
But  Mellish  could  never  abide  it ; 
But  it  signifies  very  little  what  Mellish  said, 

Because  he  is  dead. 

For  who  can  confute 
A  body  that's  mute? 


180  LETTER    TO    FIELD. 

Or  who  would  fight 
With  a  senseless  sprite  ? 
Or  think  of  troubling: 
An  impenetrable  old  goblin, 
That's  dead  and  gone, 
And  stiff  as  stone, 
To  convince  him  with  arguments  pro  and  con  ? 
As  if  some  live  logician. 
Bred  up  at  Merton, 
Or  Mr.  Hazlitt,  the  metaphysician — 
Hey,  Mr.  Ayrton  ! 
With  all  your  rare  tone.* 

For  tell  me  how  should  an  apparition 
List  to  your  call. 
Though  you  talk'd  for  ever 

Ever  so  clever : 
When  his  ear  itself. 
By  which  he  must  hear,  or  not  hear  at  all, 
Is  laid  on  the  shelf? 
Or  put  the  case 
(For  more  grace). 
It  were  a  female  spectre — 
How  could  you  expect  her 
To  take  much  gust 
In  long  speeches, 
With  her  tongue  as  dry  as  dust, 
In  a  sandy  place. 
Where  no  peaches. 
Nor  lemons,  nor  limes,  nor  oranges  hang, 
To  drop  on  the  drought  of  an  arid  harangue. 
Or  quench. 
With  their  sweet  drench. 
The  fiery  pangs  which  the  worms  inflict. 
With  their  endless  nibblings. 
Like  quibblings. 
Which  the  corpse  may  dislike,  but  can  ne'er  contradict — 
Hey,  Mr.  Ayrton? 
With  all  your  rare  tone. 

I  am, 

C.  LAMB. 

One  of  Lamb's  most  intimate  friends  and  warmest  admi- 
rers, Barron  Field,  disappeared  from  the  circle  on  being  ap- 
pointed to  a  judicial  situation  in  New  South  Wales.  In  the 
following  letter  to  him  Lamb  renewed  the  feeling  with  which 
he  had  addressed  Manning  at  the  distance  of  a  hemisphere. 

TO    MR.    FIELD. 

*'  My  dear  Barron — The  bearer  of  this  letter  so  far  across 
the  seas  is  Mr.  Lawrey,  who  comes  out  to  you  as  a  mission- 
ary, and  whom  I  have  been  strongly  importuned  to  recommend 
to  you  as  a  most  worthy  creature  by  Mr.  Fenwick,  a  very  old, 
honest  friend  of  mine ;  of  whom,  if  my  memory  does  not  de- 

*  From  this  it  may  at  first  appear  that  the  author  meant  to  ascribe  vocal 
talents  to  his  friend,  the  diredtor  of  the  Italian  Opera  ;  but  it  is  merely  a  "  line 
for  rhyme."  For,  though  the  public  were  indebted  to  Mr.  A.  for  many  fine 
foreign  singers,  we  believe  that  he  never  claimed  to  be  himself  a  singer. 


LETTER    To    FIELL.  ^81 

ceive  me,  you  have  had  some  knowledge  heretofore  as  editor 
of  '  The  Statesman,'  a  man  of  talent,  and  patriotic.  If  you  can 
show  him  any  facilities  in  his  arduous  undertaking,  you  will 
oblige  us  much.  Well,  and  how  does  the  land  of  thieves  use 
you  ?  and  how  do  you  pass  your  time  in  your  extra-judicial 
intervals?  Going  about  the  streets  with  a  lantern,  like  Diog- 
enes, looking  for  an  honest  man  ?  You  may  look  long  enough, 
I  fancy.  Do  give  me  some  notion  of  the  manners  of  the  in- 
habitants where  you  are.  They  don't  thieve  all  day  long,  do 
they  ?  No  human  property  could  stand  such  continuous  bat- 
tery.    And  what  do  they  do  when  they  ain't  stealing? 

"  Have  you  got  a  theatre  ?  What  pieces  are  performed  ? 
Shakspeare's,  I  suppose  ;  not  so  much  for  the  poetry  as  for 
his  having  once  been  in  danger  of  leaving  his  country  on  ac- 
count of  certain  '  small  deer.' 

"  Have  you  poets  among  you  ?  Cursed  plagiarists,  1  fancy, 
if  you  have  any.  I  would  not  trust  an  idea  or  a  pocket-hand- 
kerchief of  mine  among  'em.  You  are  almost  competent  to 
answer  Lord  Bacon's  problem,  whether  a  nation  of  atheists 
can  subsist  together.     You  are  practically  in  one  : 

'  So  thievish  'tis,  that  the  Eighth  Commandment  itself 
Scarce  seemeth  there  to  be.' 

Our  old  honest  world  goes  on  with  little  perceptible  variation. 

Of  course  you  have  heard  of  poor 's  death,  and  that  G. 

D.  is  one  of  Lord  Stanhope's  residuaries.     I  am  afraid  he  has 

not  touched  much  of  the  residue  yet.     B is  going  to  Dem- 

erara  or  Essequibo,  I  am  not  quite  certain  which.     A is 

turned  actor.  He  came  out  in  genteel  comedy  at  Cheltenham 
this  season,  and  has  hopes  of  a  London  engagement, 

"  For  my  own  history,  I  am  just  in  the  same  spot,  doing  the 
same  thing  (videlicet,  little  or  nothing)  as  when  you  left  me ; 
only  I  have  positive  hopes  that  I  shall  be  able  to  conquer  that 
inveterate  habit  of  smoking  which  you  may  remember  I  in- 
dulged in.  I  think  of  making  a  beginning  this  evening,  viz., 
Sunday,  31st  Aug.,  1817,  not  Wednesday,  the  2d  Feb.,  1818, 
as  it  will  be,  perhaps,  when  you  read  this  for  the  first  time. 
There  is  the  difiiculiy  of  writing  from  one  end  of  the  globe 
(hemispheres  1  call  'cm)  to  another.  Wliy,  half  tiie  truths  I 
have  sent  you  in  this  letter  will  become  lies  before  they  reach 
you,  and  some  of  the  lies  (which  I  have  mixed  for  variety's 
sake,  and  to  exercise  your  judgment  in  llie  finding  of  iheni  out) 
may  be  turned  into  sad  realities  before  you  shall  be  called 
upon  to  detect  them.  Such  are  the  defects  of  going  by  differ- 
ent chronologies.  Your  now  is  not  my  now ;  and,  again, 
your  then  is  not  my  then  ;  but  my  now  may  be  your  then,  and 
vice  versft.  Whose  head  is  competent  to  these  things  ? 
16 


182  LETTER    TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH. 

*'  How  does  Mrs.  Field  get  on  in  her  geography  ?  Does 
she  know  where  she  is  by  this  time  ?  I  am  not  sure  some- 
times you  are  not  in  another  planet :  but  then  I  don't  like  to 
ask  Capt.  Burney,  or  any  of  those  that  know  anything  about 
it,  for  fear  of  exposing  my  ignorance. 

"  Our  kindest  remembrances,  however,  to  Mrs.  F.,  if  she 
will  accept  of  reminiscences  from  another  planet,  or  at  least 
another  hemisphere." 

Lamb's  intention  of  spending  the  rest  of  his  days  in  the 
Middle  Temple  was  not  to  be  realized.  The  inconveniences 
of  being  in  chambers  began  to  be  felt  as  he  and  his  sister 
grew  older,  and  in  the  autumn  of  this  year  they  removed  to 
lodgings  in  Russell-street,  Covent  Garden,  the  corner  house, 
delightfully  situated  between  the  two  great  theatres.  In  No- 
vember, 1817,  Miss  Lamb  announced  the  removal  to  Miss 
Wordsworth  in  a  letter,  to  which  Lamb  added  the  following : 

TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH. 

"Dear  Miss  Wordsworth — Here  we  are  transplanted  from 

our  native  soil.     I  thought  we  never  could  have  been  torn  up 

from  the  Temple.     Indeed,  it  was  an  ugly  wrench,  but  like  a 

tooth,  now  'tis  out,  and  I  am  easy.     We  never  can  strike  root 

so  deep  in  any  other  ground.     This  where  we  are  is  a  light 

bit  of  gardener's  mould,  and  if  they  take  us  up  from  it  it  will 

cost  no  blood  and  groans,  like  mandrakes  pulled  up.     We  are 

in  the  individual  spot  I  like  best  in  all  this  great  city.     The 

theatres,  with  all  their  noises.     Covent  Garden,  dearer  to  me 

than  any  gardens  of  Alcinous,  where  we  are  morally  sure  of 

the    earliest    peas    and    'sparagus.       Bow-street,   where    the 

thieves  are  examined,  within  a  few  yards  of  us.     Mary  had 

not  been  here  four-and-twenty  hours  before  she  saw  a  thief. 

She  sits  at  the  window  working;  and  casually  throwing  out 

her  eyes,  she  sees  a  concourse  of  people  coming  this  way, 

with  a  constable  to  conduct  the  solemnity.     These  incidents 

agreeably  diversify  a  female  life. 

*  *  *  *  *  * 

"  Mary  has  brought  her  part  of  this  letter  to  an  orthodox 
and  loving  conclusion,  which  is  very  well,  for  I  have  no 
room  for  pansies  and  remembrances.  What  a  nice  holyday 
I  got  on  Wednesday  by  favour  of  a  princess  dying ! 

''  C.  L." 


MISS    BURRELL.  183 


CHAPTER  XI. 

[1818  to  1820.] 
Letters  to  Mrs.  Wordsworth,  Southey,  Manning,  and  Coleridge. 

Lamb,  now  in  the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  the  theatres, 
renewed  the  dramatic  associations  of  his  youth,  which  the 
failure  of  one  experiment  had  not  chilled.  Although  he  rath- 
er loved  to  dwell  on  the  recollections  of  the  actors  who  had 
passed  from  the  stage  than  to  mingle  with  the  happy  crowds 
who  hailed  the  successive  triumphs  of  Mr.  Kean,  he  formed 
some  new  and  steady  theatrical  attachments.  His  chief  fa- 
vourites of  this  time  were  Miss  Kelly,  Miss  Burrell  of  the 
Olympic,  and  Munden.  The  first,  then  the  sole  support  of 
the  English  Opera,  became  a  frequent  guest  in  Great  Russel- 
street,  and  charmed  the  circle  there  by  the  heartiness  of  her 
manners,  the  delicacy  and  gentleness  of  her  remarks,  and  her 
unaffected  sensibility,  as  much  as  she  had  done  on  the  stage. 
Miss  Burrell,  a  lady  of  more  limited  powers,  but  with  a  frank 
and  noble  style,  was  discovered  by  Lamb  on  one  of  the  visits 
which  he  paid,  on  the  invitation  of  his  old  friend  Elliston,  to 
the  Olympic,  where  the  lady  performed  the  hero  of  that  happy 
parody  of  Moncrieff's,  Giovanni  in  London.  To  her  Lamb 
devoted  a  little  article,  which  he  sent  to  the  Examiner,  in 
which  he  thus  addresses  her :  "  But  Giovanni,  free,  fine, 
frank-spirited,  single-hearted  creature,  turning  all  the  mischief 
into  fun  as  harmless  as  toys,  or  children's  make  believe^  what 
praise  can  we  repay  to  you  adequate  to  the  pleasure  which 
you  have  given  us  ?  We  had  better  be  silent,  for  you  have 
no  name,  and  our  mention  will  but  be  thought  fantastical. 
You  have  taken  out  the  sling  from  the  evil  thing,  by  what 
magic  we  know  not,  for  there  are  actresses  of  greater  merit 
and  likelihood  than  you.  With  you  and  your  Giovanni  our 
spirits  will  hold  communion,  whenever  sorrow  or  suffering 
shall  be  our  lot.  We  have  seen  you  triumph  over  the  infernal 
powers  ;  and  pain  and  Erebus,  and  the  powers  of  darkness, 
are  shapes  of  a  dream."  Miss  Burrell  soon  married  a  person 
named  Gold,  and  disappeared  from  the  stage.  To  Munden 
in  prose,  and  Miss  Kelly  in  verse.  Lamb  has  done  ample 
justice. 

Lamb's  increasing  celebrity  and  universal  kindness  rapidly 


184  LETTER    TO     MRS.    WORDSWORTh 

increased  the  number  of  his  visiters.     He  thus  complained, 
in  wayward  mood,  of  them  to  Mrs.  Wordsworth  :-  — 

TO    MRS.    WORDSWORTH. 

"  East  India  House,  18th  Feb.,  1818. 
"  My  dear  Mrs.  Wordsworth — I  have  repeatedly  taken  pen 
in  hand  to  answer  your  kind  letter.  My  sister  should  more 
properly  have  done  it,  but  she  having  failed,  I  consider  myself 
answerable  for  her  debts.  I  am  now  trying  to  do  it  in  the 
midst  of  commercial  noises,  and  with  a  quill  which  seems 
more  ready  to  glide  into  arithmetical  figures  and  names  of 
gourds,  cassia,  cardemoms,  aloes,  ginger,  or  tea,  than  into 
kindly  responses  and  friendly  recollections.  The  reason  why 
I  cannot  write  letters  at  home  is,  that  I  am  never  alone. 
Plato's — (I  write  to  W.  W.  now) — Plato's  double-animal 
parted  never  longed  more  to  be  reciprocally  reunited  in  the 
system  of  its  first  creation,  than  I  sometimes  do  to  be  but  for 
a  moment  single  and  separate.  Except  my  morning's  walk 
to  the  office,  which  is  like  treading  on  sands  of  gold  for  that 
reason,  I  am  never  so.  I  cannot  walk  home  from  office 
but  some  officious  friend  offers  his  unwelcome  courtesies  to 
accompany  me.  All  the  morning  I  am  pestered.  I  could  sit 
and  gravely  cast  up  sums  in  great  books,  or  compare  sum  with 
sum,  and  write  '  paid'  against  this,  and  '  unpaid'  against  t'other, 
and  yet  reserve  in  some  corner  of  my  mind  '  some  darling 
thoughts  all  my  own' — faint  memory  of  some  passage  in  a 
book,  or  the  tone  of  an  absent  friend's  voice — a  snatch  of 
Miss  Burrell's  singing,  or  a  gleam  of  Fanny  Kelly's  divine 
plain  face.  The  two  operations  might  be  going  on  at  the 
same  time  without  thwarting,  as  the  sun's  two  motions  (earth's, 
I  mean),  or,  as  I  sometimes  turn  round  till  I  am  giddy  in  my 
back  parlour,  while  my  sister  is  walking  longitudinally  in  the 
front ;  or,  as  the  shoulder  of  veal  twists  round  with  the  spit, 
while  the  smoke  wreathes  up  the  chimney.  But  there  are  a 
set  of  amateurs  of  the  Belles  Lettres — the  gay  science — who 
come  to  me  as  a  sort  of  rendezvous,  putting  questions  of  crit- 
icism, of  British  Institutions,  Lalla  Rookhs,  &;c. — what  Cole- 
ridge said  at  the  lecture  last  night — who  have  the  form  of 
reading  men,  but,  for  any  possible  use  reading  can  be  to  them 
but  to  talk  of,  might  as  well  have  been  Ante-Cadmeans  born, 
or  have  lain  sucking  out  the  sense  of  an  Egyptian  hieroglyph 
as  long  as  the  pyramids  will  last  before  they  should  find  it. 
These  pests  worrit  me  at  business  and  in  all  its  intervals, 
perplexing  my  accounts,  poisoning  my  little  salutary  warming- 
time  at  the  fire,  puzzling  my  paragraphs  if  I  take  a  newspaper, 
cramming  in  between  my  own  free  thoughts  and  a  column  of 


LETTER    TO    MRS.    WORDSWORTH.  185 

figures  which  had  come  to  an  amicable  compromise  but  for 
them.  Their  noise  ended,  one  of  them,  as  I  said,  accompa- 
nies me  home,  lest  I  should  be  solitary  for  a  moment  ;  he  at 
length  takes  his  welcome  leave  at  the  door  ;  up  1  go,  mutton 
on  table,  hungry  as  hunter,  hope  to  forget  my  cares,  and  bury 
them  in  the  aareeable  abstraction  of  mastication  ;  knock  at 

the  door,  in  comes  Mrs. ,  or  M ,  or  Demi-gorgon,  or 

my  brother,  or  somebody,  to  prevent  my  eating  alone — a  pro- 
cess absolutely  necessary  to  my  poor  wretched  digestion. 
Oh,  the  pleasure  of  eating  alone  !  eating  my  dinner  alone  I 
let  me  think  of  it.  But  in  they  come,  and  make  it  absolutely 
necessary  that  I  should  open  a  bottle  of  orange — for  my  meat 
turns  into  stone  when  any  one  dines  with  me  if  I  have  not 
wine.  Wine  can  mollify  stones ;  then  that  wine  turns  into 
acidity,  acerbity,  misanthropy,  a  hatred  of  ray  interrupters 
(God  bless  'em  !  I  love  some  of  'em  dearly),  and,  with  the 
hatred,  a  still  greater  aversion  to  their  going  away.  Bad  is 
the  dead  sea  they  bring  upon  me,  choking  and  deadening,  but 
worse  is  the  deader  dry  sand  they  leave  me  on  i^  they  go 
before  bedtime.  Come  never,  I  would  say  to  these  spoilers 
of  my  dinner  ;  but,  if  you  come,  never  go !  The  fact  is,  this 
interruption  does  not  happen  very  often,  but  every  time  it 
comes  by  surprise,  that  present  bane  of  my  life,  orange  wine, 
with  all  its  dreary  stifling  consequences,  follows.  Evening 
company  I  should  always  like  had  I  any  mornings,  but  I  am 
saturated  with  human  faces  (^divine  forsooth!)  and  voices  all 
the  golden  morning  ;  and  five  evenings  in  a  week  would  be 
as  much  as  I  should  covet  to  be  in  company,  but  I  assure  you 
that  is  a  wonderful  week  in  which  I  can  get  two,  or  one  to 
myself.  I  am  never  C.  L.,but  always  C.  L.  &  Co.  He  who 
thought  it  not  good  for  man  to  be  alone,  preserve  me  from  the 
more  prodigious  monstrosity  of  being  never  by  myself.  I  for- 
get bedtime,  but  even  there  these  sociable  frogs  clamber  up 
to  annoy  me.  Once  a  week,  generally  some  singular  evening 
that!  being  alone,  I  go  to  bed  at  the  hour  I  ought  always  to 
be  abed  ;  just  close  to  my  bedroom  window  is  the  clubroom 
of  a  public  house,  where  a  set  of  singers,  I  take  them  to  be 
chorus  singers  of  the  two  theatres  (it  must  be  both  of  them) ^ 
begin  their  orgies.  Thoy  an*  a  set  of  fellows  (as  I  conceive) 
who,  being  limited  by  their  talents  to  the  burden  of  the  song 
at  the  playhouses,  in  revenge,  have  got  the  common  popular 
airs  by  Bishop,  or  some  cheap  composer,  arranged  for  cho- 
ruses, that  is,  to  be  sung  all  in  chorus.  At  least,  I  never  can 
catch  any  of  the  text  of  the  plain  song,  nothing  but  the  Babylo- 
nish choral  howl  at  the  tail  on't.  '  That  fury  being  qucneh'd' — 
the  howl,  I  mean — a  burden  succeeds  of  shouts  and  clapping 
16*- 


186  LETTER    TO    MRS.  WORDSWORTH. 

and  knocking  of  the  table.  At  length  overtasked  nature  drops 
under  it,  and  escapes  for  a  few  hours  into  the  society  of  the 
sweet  silent  creatures  of  dreams,  which  go  away  with  mocks 
and  mows  at  cockcrow.  And  then  I  think  of  the  words 
Christabel's  father  used  (bless  me,  I  have  dipped  in  the  wrong 
ink)  to  say  every  morning  by  way  of  variety  when  he  awoke : 

'  Every  knell  the  Baron  saith, 
Wakes  us  up  to  a  world  of  death' — 

or  something  like  it.  All  I  mean  by  this  senseless  interrupted 
tale  is,  that,  by  my  central  situation,  I  am  a  little  over-com- 
panied.  Not  that  I  have  any  animosity  against  the  good 
creatures  that  are  so  anxious  to  drive  away  the  happy  solitude 
from  me.  I  like  'em,  and  cards,  and  a  cheerful  glass,  but  I 
mean  merely  to  give  you  an  idea  between  office  confinement 
and  after-ofl^ce  society,  how  little  time  I  can  call  my  own.  I 
mean  only  to  draw  a  picture,  not  to  make  an  inference.  I 
would  not,  that  I  know  of,  have  it  otherwise.  I  only  wish 
sometimes  I  could  exchange  some  of  my  faces  and  voices  for 
the  faces  and  voices  which  a  late  visitation  brought  most  wel- 
come, and  carried  away,  leaving  regret  but  more  pleasure, 
even  a  kind  of  gratitude,  at  being  so  often  favoured  with  that 
kind  northern  visitation.  My  London  faces  and  noises  don't 
hear  me — 1  mean  no  disrespect,  or  1  should  explain  myself, 
that,  instead  of  their  return  two  hundred  and  twenty  limes  a 
year,  and  the  return  of  W.  W.,  &:c.,  seven  times  in  one  hun- 
dred and  four  weeks,  some  more  equal  distribution  might  be 
found.  I  have  scarce  room  to  put  in  Mary's  kind  love,  and 
my  poor  name, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

" goes  on  lecturing.     I  mean   to  hear  some  of  the 

course,  but  lectures  are  not  much  to  my  taste,  whatever  the 
lecturer  may  be.  If  read,  they  are  dismal  flat,  and  you  can't 
think  why  you  are  brought  together  to  hear  a  man  read  his 
works,  which  you  could  read  so  much  better  at  leisure  your- 
self; if  delivered  extempore,  1  am  always  in  pain,  lest  the 
gift  of  utterance  should  suddenly  fail  the  orator  in  the  middle, 
as  it  did  me  at  the  dinner  given  in  honour  of  me  at  the  Lon- 
don Tavern.  *  Gentlemen,'  said  I,  and  there  I  stopped ;  the 
rest  my  feelings  were  under  the  necessity  of  supplying.  Mrs. 
Wordsworth  will  go  on,  kindly  haunting  us  with  visions  of 
seeing  the  lakes  once  more,  which  never  can  be  realized. 
Between  us  there  is  a  great  gulf,  not  of  inexplicable  moral 
antipathies  and  distances,  I  hope,  as  there  seemed  to  be  be- 
tween me  and  that  gentleman  concerned  in  the  stamp-office, 
that  I  so  strangely  recoiled  from  at  Haydon's.     I  think  I  had 


LETTER    TO    SOUTHEY.  187 

an  instinct  that  he  was  the  head  of  an  office.  I  hate  all  such 
people — accountants'  deputy  accountants.  The  dear  abstract 
notion  of  the  East  India  Company,  as  long  as  she  is  unseen, 
is  pretty,  rather  poetical ;  but,  as  she  makes  herself  manifest  by 
the  persons  of  such  beasts,  I  loathe  and  detest  her  as  the  scarlet 
what-do-you-call-her  of  Babylon.  I  thought,  after  abridging  us 
of  all  our  red-letter  days,  they  had  done  their  worst,  but  I  was 
deceived  in  the  length  to  which  heads  of  offices,  those  true  lib- 
erty-haters, can  go.  They  are  the  tyrants,  not  Ferdinand,  nor 
Nero ;  by  a  decree  passed  this  week,  they  have  abridged  us 
of  the  immemorially-observed  custom  of  going  at  one  o'clock 
of  a  Saturday,  the  little  shadow  of  a  holyday  left  us.  Dear 
W.  W.,  be  thankful  for  liberty." 

Among  Lamb's  new  acquaintances  was  Mr.  Charles  Oilier, 
a  voung  bookseller  of  considerable  literary  talent,  which  he 
has  since  exhibited  in  the  original  and  beautiful  tale  of  "  Ine- 
silla,"  who  proposed  to  him  the  publication  of  his  scattered 
writings  in  a  collected  form.  Lamb  acceded  ;  and  nearly  all 
he  had  then  written  in  prose  and  verse  were  published  this 
year  by  Mr.  Oilier  and  his  brother,  in  two  small  and  elegant 
volumes.  Early  copies  were  despatched  to  Southey  and 
Wordsworth  ;  the  acknowledgments  of  the  former  of  whom 
produced  a  reply,  from  which  the  following  is  an  extract : — 

TO    MR.  SOUTHEY. 

"Monday,  Oct.  26,  1818. 
"  Dear  Southey — I  am  pleased  with  your  friendly  remem- 
brances of  my  little  things.  I  do  not  know  whether  I  have 
done  a  silly  thing  or  a  wise  one,  but  it  is  of  no  great  conse- 
quence. I  run  no  risk,  and  care  for  no  censures.  My  bread 
and  cheese  is  stable  as  the  foundations  of  Leadenhall-sireet, 
and,  if  it  hold  out  as  long  as  the  '  foundations  of  our  empire  in 
the  East,'  I  shall  do  pretty  well.  You  and  W.  VV.  should 
have  had  your  presentation  copies  more  ceremoniously  sent, 
but  I  had  no  copies  when  I  was  leaving  town  for  my  holydays, 
and,  rather  than  delay,  commissioned  my  bookseller  to  send 
them  thus  nakedly.  By  not  hearing  from  VV.  W.  or  you,  I 
began  to  be  afraid  Murray  had  not  sent  them.  I  do  not  see  S. 
T.  C.  so  often  as  I  could  wish.  I  am  belter  than  I  deserve  lo  be. 
The  hot  weather  has  been  such  a  treat!  Mary  joins  in  this 
little  corner  in  kindest  remembrance  to  you  all. 

"  C.  L." 

Tiamh's  interest  was   strongly  excited   for  Mr.  Kenney  on 
the  production  of  his  comedy,  entitled  "  A  Word  to  the  La- 


188  LETTER    TO    COLERIDGE. 

dies"     Lamb  had  engaged  to  contribute  the  prologue ;  but 
the  promise  pressed  hard  upon  him,  and  he  procured  the  re- 
quisite quantity  of  verse  from  a  very  inferior  hand.     Kenney, 
who  had  married  Holcroft's  widow,  had  more  than  succeeded 
to  him  in  Lamb's  regards.     Holcroft  had  considerable  dra 
matic  skill ;  great  force  and  earnestness  of  style,  and  nobh 
sincerity  and  uprightness  of  disposition  ;  but  he  was  an  auster 
observer  of  morals  and  manners,  and  even  his  grotesque  char 
acters  were  hardly  and  painfully  sculptured  ;  while  Kennejr 
with  as  tine  a  perception  of  the  ludicrous  and  the  peculi  li 
was  more  airy,  more  indulgent,  more  graceful,  and  exhibit e*. 
more  frequent  glimpses  of  "  the  gayest,  happiest  attitude  o\ 
things."     The  comedy  met  with  less  success  than  the  repu- 
tation of  the  author  and  brilliant  experience  of  the  past  had 
rendered  probable,  and  Lamb    had  to  perform   the  office  of 
comforter,  as  he  had  done  on  the  more  unlucky  event  to  (God- 
win.    To  this  play  Lamb  refers  in  the  following  note  to  (Jole- 
ridge,  who  was  contemplating  a  course  of  lectures  on  Shak- 
speare,  and  who  sent  Lamb  a  ticket  with  sad  forebodings  that 
the  course  would  be  his  last. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

*'  My  dear  Coleridge — T  have  been  in  a  state  of  incessant 
hurry  ever  since  the  receipt  of  your  ticket.  It  found  me  in- 
capable of  attending  you,  it  being  the  night  of  Kenney'u  new 
comedy.  You  know  my  local  aptitudes  at  such  a  time ;  I 
have  been  a  thorough  rendezvous  for  all  consultations  ;  my 
head  begins  to  clear  up  a  little,  but  it  has  had  belly  in  it. 
Thank  you  kindly  for  your  ticket,  though  the  raournfui  prog- 
nostic which  accompanies  it  certainly  renders  its  pe/manent 
pretensions  less  marketable  ;  but  I  trust  to  hear  many  a  course 
yet.  You  excepted  Christmas  week,  by  which  I  Uiioerstood 
next  week ;  I  thought  Christmas  week  was  that  which  Christ- 
mas Sunday  ushered  in.  We  are  sorry  it  never  lies  m  your 
way  to  come  to  us ;  but,  dear  Mohammed,  we  will  cume  to  you. 
Will  it  be  convenient  to  all  the  good  people  at  AiLghgRie  if 
we  take  a  stage  up,  not  next  Sunday,  but  the  foil j wing,  viz., 
3d  January,  1819 — shall  we  be  too  late  to  catch  a  ukirt  of  the 
old  outgoer?  how  the  years  crumble  from  undtr  us!  We 
shall  hope  to  see  you  before  then ;  but,  if  not,  lei  us  know  /f 
then  will  be  convenient.     Can  we  secure  a  coacJi  home  ? 

"  Believe  me  evor  yours, 

"C.  Lamb. 

"I  have  but  one  holyday,  which  is  Chris  mas  day  itself 
nakedly,  no  pretty  garnish  and  fringes  of  St.  J»/hn's  day.  Holy 
Innocents',  &;c.,  that  used  to  bestud  it  all  arc  and  in  the  cal- 


LETTERS    TO    WORDSWORTH.  189 

endar.     Improhe  labor  !    I  write  six  hours  every  day  in  this 
candlelight  fog-den  at  Leadenhall." 

In  the  next  year  [1819]  liamb  was  greatly  pleased  by  the 
dedication  to  him  of  Wordsworth's  poem  of  "  The  Wagoner," 
wliich  Wordsworth  had  read  to  him  in  MS.  thirteen  years  be- 
fore. On  receipt  of  the  little  volume  Lamb  acknowledged  it 
as  follows. 

TO    MR.  WORDSWORTH. 

"  My  dear  Wordsworth — You  cannot  imagine  how  proud 
we  are  here  of  the  dedication.  We  read  it  twice  for  once 
that  we  do  the  poem.  I  mean  all  through  ;  yet  '  Benjamin' 
is  no  common  favourite  ;  there  is  a  spirit  of  beautiful  tolerance 
in  it  ;  it  is  as  good  as  it  was  in  1806  ;  and  will  be  as  good  in 
1829,  if  our  dim  eyes  shall  be  awake  to  peruse  it.  Methinks 
there  is  a  kind  of  shadowing  affinity  between  the  subject  of 
the  narrative  and  the  subject  of  the  dedication  ;  but  I  will  not 
enter  into  personal  themes,  else,  substituting  *******  ****  for 
Ben,  and  the  Honourable  United  Company  of  Merchants, 
trading  to  the  East  Indies,  for  the  master  of  the  misused  team, 
it  might  seem,  by  no  far-fetched  analogy,  to  point  its  dim  warn- 
ings hitherward  ;  but  I  reject  the  omen,  especially  as  its  im- 
port seems  to  have  been  diverted  to  another  victim. 

"I  will  never  write  another  letter  with  alternate  inks.  You 
cannot  imagine  how  it  cramps  the  flow  of  the  style.  I  can 
conceive  Pindar  (I  do  not  mean  to  compare  myself  to  him), 
by  the  command  of  Hiero,  the  Sicilian  tyrant  (was  not  he  the 
tyrant  of  some  place?  fy  on  my  neglect  of  history) — I  can 
conceive  him,  by  command  of  Hiero  or  Perillus,  set  down  to 
pen  an  Isthmian  or  Nemean  panegyric  in  lines,  alternate  red 
and  black.  I  maintain  he  couldn't  have  done  it ;  it  would  have 
been  a  strait-laced  torture  to  his  muse  ;  he  would  have  called 
for  the  bull  for  a  relief.  Neither  could  Lycidas  nor  the  Chro- 
rics  (how  do  you  like  the  word?)  of  Samson  Agonistes  have 
been  written  with  two  inks.  Your  couplets  with  points,  epi- 
logues to  Mr.  ll.'s,  <tc.,  might  be  even  benefited  by  tiie  twy- 
foiint,  where  one  line  (the  second)  is  for  point,  and  tlie  first  for 
rhyme.  I  think  the  alternation  would  assist,  like  a  mould.  I 
maintain  it,  you  could  not  have  written  your  stanzas  on  pre- 
exislence  with  two  inks.  'IVy  another  ;  and  Rogers,  with  his 
silver  standisli,  having  one  ink  only,  I  will  bet  my  'Ode  on 
Tobacco'  against  tiic  '  Pleasures  of  Memory' — and  '  Hope,' 
too,  shall  put  more  fervour  of  enthusiasm  into  the  same  subject 
than  you  can  with  your  two;  he  shall  do  it  stans  pede  in  uno^ 
as  it  were. 

H  3 


190  LETTERS    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

*' The  'Wagoner'  is  very  ill  put  up  in  boards,  at  least  it 
seems  to  me  always  to  open  at  the  dedication ;  but  that  is  a 
mechanical  fault.  I  reread  the  *  White  Doe  of  Rylstoiie ;' 
the  title  should  be  always  written  at  length,  as  Mary  Sabilla 

N ,  a  very  nice  woman  of  our  acquaintance,  always  signs 

hers  at  the  bottom  of  the  shortest  note.     Mary  told  her,  if  her 

name  had  been  Mary  Aim,  she  would  have  signed  M.  A.  N , 

or  M.  only,  dropping  the  A.,  which  makes  me  think,  with  some 
other  trifles,  that  she  understands  something  of  human  nature. 
My  pen  goes  galloping  on  most  rhapsodically,  glad  to  have 
escaped  the  bondage  of  two  inks. 

"  Manning  had  just  sent  it  home,  and  it  came  as  fresh  to  me 
as  the  immortal  creature  it  speaks  of.  M.  sent  it  home  with 
a  note,  having  this  passage  in  it :  'I  cannot  help  writing  to  you 
while  I  am  reading  Wordsworth's  poem.  I  have  got  into  the 
third  canto,  and  say  that  it  raises  my  opinion  of  him  very  much 
indeed.*  'Tis  broad,  noble,  poetical,  with  a  masterly  scanning 
of  human  actions,  absolutely  above  common  readers.  What 
a  manly  (implied)  interpretation  of  (bad)  party-actions,  as 
trampling  the  Bible,  &c.,'  and  so  he  goes  on. 

"  I  do  not  know  which  I  like  best,  the  prologue  (the  latter 
part  especially)  to  P.  Bell,  or  the  epilogue  to  Benjamin.  Yes, 
1  tell  stories ;  I  do  know  I  like  the  last  best ;  and  the  '  Wag- 
oner' altogether  is  a  pleasanter  remembrance  to  me  than  the 
'  Itinerant.'  If  it  were  not,  the  page  before  the  first  page  would 
and  ought  to  make  it  so. 

"  If,  as  you  say,  the  '  Wagoner,'  in  some  sort,  came  at  my 
call,  oh  for  a  potent  voice  to  call  forth  the  '  Recluse'  from  his 
profound  dormitory,  where  he  sleeps  forgetful  of  his  foolish 
charge — the  world. 

"  Had  I  three  inks,  I  would  invoke  him  !  Talfourd  has 
written  a  most  kind  review  of  J.  Woodvil,  <fe-c.,  in  the  '  Cham- 
pion.' He  is  your  most  zealous  admirer,  in  solitude  and  in 
crowds.  H.  Crabbe  Robinson  gives  me  any  dear  prints  that  I 
happen  to  admire,  and  I  love  him  for  it  and  for  other  things. 
Alsager  shall  have  his  copy,  but  at  present  I  have  lent  iifor  a 
day  onlij^  not  choosing  to  part  with  my  own.  Mary's  love. 
How  do  you  all  do,  amanuenses  both — marital  and  sororal  ? 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  next  letter  which  remains  is  addressed  to  Manning  (re- 
turned to  England,  and  domiciled  in  Hertfordshire),  in  the 
spring  of  1819. 

*  "  N.B. — M.,  from  his  perei^rinations,  is  twelve  or  fourteen  years  behind  in 
his  knowledge  of  who  has  or  has  not  written  good  verse  of  late." 


LETTER    TO    MANNING.  191 


TO    MR.  MANNING. 

"  My  dear  M. — I  want  to  know  how  your  brother  is,  if  you 
have  heard  lately.  I  want  to  know  about  you.  I  wish  you 
were  nearer.  How  are  my  cousins,  the  Gladmans,  of  Wheat- 
hamstead,  and  farmer  Bruton  ?  Mrs.  Bruton  is  a  glorious 
woman. 

"  Hail,  Mackery  End." 

This  is  a  fragment  of  a  blank  verse  poem  which  I  once  med- 
itated, but  got  no  further.*     The  E.  I.  H.  has  been  thrown  into 

a  quandary  by  the   strange  phenomenon  of  poor , 

whom  I  have  known  man  and  madman  twenty-seven  years,  he 
being  elder  here  than  myself  by  nine  years  and  more.  He 
was  always  a  pleasant,  gossiping,  half-headed,  muzzy,  dozing, 
dreaming,  walk-about,  inoffensive  chap  ;  a  little  too  fond  of  the 

creature  ;   who  isn't  at  times  ?  but had  not  brains  to  work 

off  an  overnight's  surfeit  by  ten  o'clock  next  morning,  and,  un- 
fortunately, in  he  wandered  the  other  morning  drunk  with  last 
night,  and  with  a  superfetalion  of  drink  taken  in  since  he  set 
out  from  bed.  He  came  staggering  under  his  double  burden, 
like  trees  in  Java,  bearing  at  once  blossom,  fruit,  and  falling 
fruit,  as  I  have  heard  you  or  some  other  traveller  tell,  with  his 
face  literally  as  blue  as  the  bluest  firmament ;  some  wretched 
calico  that  he  had  mopped  his  poor  oozy  front  with  had  ren- 
dered up  its  native  die,  and  the  devil  a  bit  would  he  consent  to 
wash  it,  but  swore  it  was  characteristic,  for  he  was  going  to 
the  sale  of  indigo,  and  set  up  a  laugh  which  I  did  not  think  the 
lungs  of  mortal  man  were  competent  to.  It  was  like  a  thou- 
sand people  laughing,  or  the  Goblin  Page.  He  imagined  after- 
ward that  the  whole  office  had  been  laughing  at  him,  so  strange 

did  his  own  sounds  strike  upon  his  nonsensorium.     But 

has  laughed  his  last  laugh,  and  awoke  the  next  day  to  find  him- 
self reduced  from  an  abused  income  of  600/.  per  annum  to 
one  sixth  of  the  sum,  after  thirty-six  years'  tolerably  good  ser- 
vice. The  quality  of  mercy  was  not  strained  in  his  behalf; 
the  gentle  dews  dropped  not  on  him  from  heaven.  It  just  came 
across  me  that  I  was  writing  to  Canton.  Will  you  drop  in  to- 
morrow night?  Fanny  Kelly  is  coming,  if  she  does  not  cheat 
us.  Mrs.  Gold  is  well,  but  proves  '  uncoin'd,'  as  the  lovers 
about  Wheathamstead  would  say. 

"I  have  not  had  such  a  quiet  half  hour  to  sit  down  to  a 
quiet  letter  for  many  years.      I   have   not  been  interrupted 

♦  See  "Mackery  End,  in  Hertfordshire,"  vol.  ii..  p.  91,  for  a  charming  ac- 
count  of  a  visit  to  their  cousin  in  the  country  with  Mr.  Barron  Field. 


192  LETTER    TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH. 

above  four  times.  I  wrote  a  letter  the  other  day  in  alternate 
lines,  black  ink  and  red,  and  you  cannot  think  how  it  chilled 
the  flow  of  ideas.  Next  Monday  is  Whit-Monday.  What  a 
reflection !  Twelve  years  ago,  and  I  should  have  kept  that 
and  the  following  holyday  in  the  fields  a  Maying.  All  of 
those  pretty  pastoral  delights  are  over.  This  dead,  everlast- 
ing dead  desk — how  it  weighs  the  spirit  of  a  gentleman  down ! 
This  dead  wood  of  the  desk,  instead  of  your  living  trees  !  But 
then,  again,  I  hate  the  Joskins,  a  name  for  Hertfordshire  bump- 
kins. Each  state  of  life  has  its  inconvenience  ;  but  then, 
again,  mine  has  more  than  one.  Not  that  I  repine,  or  grudge, 
or  murmur  at  my  destiny.  1  have  meat  and  drink,  and  decent 
apparel ;  I  shall,  at  least,  when  I  get  a  new  hat. 

"  A  redhaired  man  just  interrupted  me.  He  has  broke  the 
current  of  my  thoughts.  I  haven't  a  word  to  add.  I  don't 
know  why  I  send  this  letter,  but  I  have  had  a  hankering  to 
hear  about  you  some  days.  Perhaps  it  will  go  off'  before  your 
reply  comes.  If  it  don't,  I  assure  you  no  letter  was  ever 
welcome!  from  vou,  from  Paris  or  Macao. 

"C.  Lamb." 

The  following  letter,  Gated  25th  November,  1819,  is  ad- 
dressed to  Miss  Wordsworth,  on  Wordsworth's  youngest  son 
visiting  Lamb  in  London. 

TO    Miss    WORDSWORTH. 

"  Dear  Miss  Wordsworth — You  will  think  me  negligent ; 
but  I  wanted  to  see  more  of  William  before  I  ventured  to  ex- 
press a  prediction.  Till  yesterday  I  had  barely  seen  him — 
Virgilium  tantum  vidi — but  yesterday  he  gave  us  his  small 
company  to  a  bullock's  heart,  and  I  can  pronounce  him  a  lad 
of  promise.  He  is  no  pedant  nor  bookworm  ;  so  far  I  can 
answer.  Perhaps  he  has,  hitherto,  paid  too  little  attention  to 
other  men's  inventions,  preferring,  like  Lord  Foppington,  the 
*  natural  sprouts  of  his  own.'  But  he  has  observation,  and 
seems  thoroughly  awake.  I  am  ill  at  remembering  other 
people's  hons  mots,  but  the  following  are  a  few  : — Being  taken 
over  Waterloo  Bridge,  he  remarked,  that  if  we  had  no  mount- 
ains, we  had  a  fine  river  at  least ;  which  was  a  touch  of  the 
comparative  :  but  then  he  added,  in  a  strain  which  augured 
less  for  his  future  abilities  as  a  political  economist,  that  he 
supposed  they  must  take  at  least  a  pound  a  week  toll.  Like 
a  curious  naturalist,  he  inquired  if  the  tide  did  not  come  up 
a  little  salty.  This  being  satisfactorily  answered,  he  put 
another  question,  as  to  the  flux  and  reflux  ;  which,  being  rath- 
er cunningly  evaded  than  artfully  solved  by  that  she-Aristotle, 


LETTER    TO    MISS    WORDSWORTH.  193 

Maiy,  who  muttered  soiiicthing  about  its  getting  up  an  hour 
sooner  and  sooner  every  day,  he  sagely  replied,  '  Then  it  must 
come  to  the  same  thing  at  last ;'  which  was  a  speech  worthy 
of  an  infant  Halley  !  The  lion  in  the  'Change  by  no  means 
came  up  to  his  ideal  standard  ;  so  impossible  is  it  for  Nature, 
in  any  of  her  works,  to  come  up  to  the  standard  of  a  child's 
imagination  !  The  whelps  (lionets)  he  was  sorry  to  find  were 
dead;  and,  on  particular  inquiry,  his  old  Iriend  the  ourang- 
outang  had  gone  the  way  of  all  flesh  also.  The  grand  tiger 
was  also  sick,  and  expected  in  no  short  time  to  exchange  this 
transitory  world  for  another,  or  none.  But,  again,  there  was 
a  golden  eagle  (I  do  not  mean  that  of  Charing)  which  did 
much  arride  and  console  him.  William's  genius,  I  take  it, 
leans  a  little  to  the  figurative  ;  for,  being  at  play  at  tricktrack 
(a  kind  of  minor  billiard-table  which  we  keep  for  smaller 
wights,  and  sometimes  refresh  our  own  mature  fatigues  with 
taking  a  hand  at),  not  being  able  to  hit  a  ball  he  had  iterate 
aimed  at,  he  cried  out,  '  I  cannot  hit  that  beast.'  Now  the 
balls  are  usually  called  men,  but  he  felicitously  hit  upon  a 
middle  term  ;  a  term  of  approximation  and  imaginative  recon- 
ciliation :  a  something:  where  the  two  ends  of  the  brute  matter 
(ivorv),  and  their  human  and  rather  violent  personification 
into  men,  might  meet,  as  I  take  it,  illustrative  of  that  excel- 
lent remark,  in  a  certain  preface  about  imagination,  explaining 
'  Like  a  seabeast  that  had  crawled  forth  to  sun  himself.'  Not 
that  I  accuse  William  Minor  of  hereditary  plagiary,  or  con- 
ceive the  image  to  have  come  from  the  paternal  store.  Rath- 
er he  seemeth  to  keep  aloof  from  any  source  of  imitation, 
and  purposely  to  remain  ignorant  of  what  mighty  poets  have 
done  in  this  kind  before  him  ;  for,  being  asked  if  his  father 
had  ever  been  on  W'estminster  Bridge,  he  answered  that  he 
did  not  know  ! 

"  It  is  hard  to  discern  the  oak  in  the  acorn,  or  a  temple 
like  St.  Paul's  in  the  first  stone  which  is  laid  ;  nor  can  I  quite 
prefigure  what  destination  the  genius  of  William  Minor  hath 
to  take.  Some  few  hints  I  liavc  set  down  to  guide  my  future 
observations.  He  hath  the  power  of  calculation  in  no  ordi- 
nary degree  for  a  chit.  He  combincth  figures,  after  the  first 
boggle,  rapidly  ;  as  in  llic  tricktrack  board,  whore  the  iiits 
are  figured,  at  first  he  did  perceive  that  15  and  7  made  22, 
but  by  a  little  use  he  could  combine  8  with  25,  and  33  again 
with  16,  which  approacheth  something  in  kind  (far  lot  me  he 
from  flattering  him  by  saying  in  degree)  to  that  of  the  famous 
American  boy.  I  am  sometimes  inclined  to  think  I  perceive 
the  future  satirist  in  him,  for  he  hath  a  sub-sardonic  smile 
which  bursteth  out  upon  occasion  ;  as  wiien  he  was  asked  if 

Vol.  I.— 17  1 


194  MR.    MACREADY. 

London  were  as  big  as  Ambleside  ;  and,  indeed,  no  other  answer 
was  given  or  proper  to  be  given  to  so  ensnaring  and  provoking 
a  question.  In  the  contour  of  scull,  certainly,  I  discern  some- 
thing paternal.  But  whether  in  all  respects  the  future  man 
shall  transcend  his  father's  fame.  Time,  the  trier  of  Geniuses, 
must  decide.  Be  it  pronounced  peremptorily  at  present  that 
William  is  a  well-mannered  child,  and,  though  no  great  student, 
hath  yet  a  lively  eye  for  things  that  lie  before  him. 
"  Given  in  haste  from  my  desk  at  Leadenhall. 

"  Yours,  and  yours  most  sincerely, 

"  C.  Lamb." 


CHAPTER  XIL 

[1820  to  1823.] 
Letters  to  Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Field,  Wilson,  and  Barton. 

The  widening  circle  of  Lamb's  literary  friends  now  em 
braced  additional  authors  and  actors — famous,  or  just  bursting 
into  fame.  He  welcomed  in  the  author  of  the  "Dramatic 
Scenes,"  who  chose  to  appear  in  print  as  Barry  Cornwall,  a 
spirit  most  congenial  with  his  own  in  its  serious  moods — one 
whose  genius  he  had  assisted  to  impel  towards  its  kindred 
models,  the  great  dramatists  of  Elizabeth's  time,  and  in  whose 
success  he  received  the  first  and  best  reward  of  the  efforts 
he  had  made  to  inspire  a  taste  for  these  old  masters  of  hu- 
manity. Mr.  Macready,  who  had  just  emancipated  himself 
from  the  drudgery  of  representing  the  villains  of  tragedy,  by 
his  splendid  performance  of  Richard,  was  introduced  to  him 
by  his  old  friend  Charles  Lloyd,  who  had  visited  London  for 
change  of  scene,  under  great  depression  of  spirits.  Lloyd 
owed  a  debt  of  gratitude  to  Macready,  which  exemplified  the 
true  uses  of  the  acted  drama  with  a  force  which  it  would  take 
many  sermons  of  its  stoutest  opponents  to  reason  away.  A 
deep  gloom  had  gradually  overcast  his  mind,  and  threatened 
wholly  to  encircle  it,  when  he  was  induced  to  look  in  at  Cov- 
ent  Garden  Theatre,  and  see  the  performance  of  Roh  Roy- 
The  picture  which  he  then  beheld  of  the  generous  outlaw — 
the  frank,  gallant,  noble  bearing — the  air  and  movements,  as 
of  one  "  free  of  mountain  solitudes" — the  touches  of  manly 
pathos  and  irresistible  cordiality,  delighted  and  melted  him, 
won  him  from  his  painful  introspections,  and  brought  to  him 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  195 

the  unwonted  relief  of  tears.  He  went  home  "  a  gayer  and  a 
wiser  man ;''  returned  again  to  the  theatre  whenever  the 
healing  enjoyments  could  be  renewed  there  ;  and  sought  the 
acquaintance  of  the  actor  who  had  broken  the  melancholy 
spell  in  which  he  was  enthralled,  and  had  restored  the  pulses 
of  his  nature  to  their  healthful  beatings.  The  year  1820 
gave  Lamb  an  interest  in  Macready  beyond  that  which  he 
had  derived  from  the  introduction  of  Lloyd,  arising  from  the 
power  with  which  he  animated  the  first  production  of  one  of 
his  oldest  friends — "  Virginius."  Knowles  had  been  a  friend 
and  disciple  of  Hazlitt  from  a  boy  ;  and  Lamb  had  liked  and 
esteemed  him  as  a  hearty  companion  ;  but  he  had  not  guessed 
at  the  extraordinary  dramatic  power  which  lay  ready  for  kind- 
ling in  his  brain,  and  still  less  at  the  delicacy  of  tact  with  which 
he  had  unveiled  the  sources  of  the  most  profound  affections. 
Lamb  had  almost  lost  his  taste  for  acted  tragedy,  as  the  sad 
realities  of  life  had  pressed  more  nearly  on  him  ;  yet  he  made 
an  exception  in  favour  of  the  first  and  happiest  part  of  "  Vir- 
ginius," those  paternal  scenes  which  stand  alone  in  the  mod- 
ern drama,  and  which  Macready  informed  with  the  fulness  of 
a  father's  affection. 

The  establishment  of  the  "  London  Magazine,"  under  the 
auspices  of  Mr.  John  Scott,  occasioned  Lamb's  introduction  to 
the  public  by  the  name,  under  colour  of  which  he  acquired  his 
most  brilliant  reputation — "  Elia."  The  adoption  of  this  sig- 
nature was  purely  accidental.  His  first  contribution  to  the 
magazine  was  a  description  of  the  Old  South  Sea  House,  where 
Lamb  had  passed  a  few  months'  novitiate  as  a  clerk  thirty 
years  before,  and  of  its  inmates  who  had  long  passed  away  ; 
and  remembering  the  name  of  a  gay,  light-hearted  foreigner, 
who  fluttered  there  at  that  time,  he  subscribed  his  name  to  the 
essay.  It  was  afterward  affixed  to  subsequent  contributions  ; 
and  Lamb  used  it  until,  in  his  "Last  Essays  of  Elia,"  he  bade 
it  a  sad  farewell. 

The  perpetual  influx  of  visiters  whom  he  could  not  repel, 
whom,  indeed,  he  was  always  glad  to  welcome,  but  whose  visits 
unstrung  him,  induced  him  to  take  lodgings  at  Dalston,  to  which 
he  occasionally  retired  when  he  wished  for  repose.  The  deaths 
of  some  who  were  dear  to  him  cast  a  melancholy  tinge  on  his 
mind,  as  may  be  seen  in  the  following : — 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"20th  March,  1822. 

"  My  dear  Wordsworth — A  letter  from  you  is  very  grateful ; 
I  have  not  seen  a  Kendal  postmark  so  long !      We  are  pretty, 
well,  save  colds  and  rheumatics,  and  a  certain  deadncss  to  every- 

I  2 


196  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

thing,  which,  I  think,  I  may  date  from  poor  John's  loss,  and 
another  accident  or  two  at  the  same  time,  that  has  made  me 
almost  bury  myself  at  Dalston,  where  yet  I  see  more  faces  than 
I  could  wish.  Deaths  overset  one,  and  put  one  out  long  after 
the  recent  grief.  Two  or  three  have  died  within  this  last  two 
twelvemonths,  and  so  many  parts  of  me  have  been  numbed. 
One  sees  a  picture,  reads  an  anecdote,  starts  a  casual  fancy, 
and  thinks  to  tell  of  it  to  this  person  in  preference  to  every 
other:  the  person  is  gone  whom  it  would  have  peculiarly  suited. 
It  won't  do  for  another.  Every  departure  destroys  a  class  of 
sympathies.  There's  Captain  Burney  gone  !  What  fun  has 
whist  now  1  what  matters  it  what  you  lead,  if  you  can  no  longer 
fancy  him  looking  over  you  ?  One  never  hears  anything,  but 
the  image  of  the  particular  person  occurs  with  whom  alone  al- 
most you  would  care  to  share  the  intelligence — thus  one  dis- 
tributes one's  self  about — and  now  for  so  many  parts  of  me  I  have 
lost  the  market.  Common  natures  do  not  suffice  me.  Good 
people,  as  they  are  called,  won't  serve.  I  want  individuals. 
I  am  made  up  of  queer  points,  and  I  want  so  many  answering 
needles.  The  going  away  of  friends  does  not  make  the  re- 
mainder more  precious.  It  takes  so  much  from  them  as  there 
was  a  common  link.  A.  B.  and  C.  make  a  party.  A.  dies. 
B.  not  only  loses  A.,  but  all  A.'s  part  in  C.  C.  loses  A.'s  part 
in  B.,  and  so  the  alphabet  sickens  by  subtraction  of  inter- 
changeables.  I  express  myself  muddily,  capite  dolente.  I  have 
a  dulling  cold.  My  theory  is  to  enjoy  life,  but  my  practice  is 
against  it.  I  grow  ominously  tired  of  official  confinement. 
Thirty  years  have  I  served  the  Philistines,  and  my  neck  is  not 
subdued  to  the  yoke.  You  don't  know  how  wearisome  it  is  to 
breathe  the  air  of  four  pent  walls,  without  relief,  day  after  day, 
all  the  golden  hours  of  the  day  between  ten  and  four,  without 
ease  or  interposition.  Tcsdet  me  harum  quotidianarum  forma- 
rum,  these  pestilential  clerk-faces  always  in  one's  dish.  Oh 
for  a  {ew  years  between  the  grave  and  the  desk  !  they  are 
the  same,  save  that  at  the  latter  you  are  the  outside  machine. 

The  foul  enchanter  ,  '  letters  four  do  form  his  name' — 

Busirare  is  his  name  in  hell — that  has  curtailed  you  of  some 
domestic  comforts,  hath  laid  a  heavier  hand  on  me,  not  in  pres- 
ent infliction,  but  in  the  taking  away  the  hope  of  enfranchise 
ment.  I  dare  not  whisper  to  myself  a  pension  on  this  side  of 
absolute  incapacitation  and  infirmity,  till  years  have  sucked  me 
dry  ;  Otium  cum  indignitatc.  I  had  thought,  in  a  green  old  age 
(oh  green  thought!),  to  have  retired  to  Ponder's  End,  emble- 
matic name,  how  beautiful !  in  the  Ware  road,  there  to  have 
made  up  my  accounts  with  Heaven  and  the  company,  toddling 
about  between  it  and  Cheshunt,  anon  stretching  on  some  fine 


LETTER    TO    COLERIDGE.  197 

Izaac  Walton  morning  to  Hoddesdon  or  Amwell,  careless  as  a 
beggar ;  but  walking,  walking  ever  till  I  fairly  walked  myself 
off  my  legs,  dying  walking !  The  hope  is  gone.  I  sit  like 
Philomel  all  day  (but  not  singing),  with  my  breast  against  this 
thorn  of  a  desk,  with  the  only  hope  that  some  pulmonary  af- 
fliction may  relieve  me.  Vide  Lord  Palmerston's  report  of  the 
clerks  in  the  war-office  (Debates  this  morning's  '  Times'),  by 
which  it  appears,  in  twenty  years  as  many  clerks  have  been 
coughed  and  catarrhed  out  of  it  into  their  freer  graves.  Thank 
you  for  asking  about  the  pictures.  Milton  hangs  over  my  fire- 
side in  Covent  Garden  (when  I  am  there),  the  rest  have  been 
sold  for  an  old  song,  wanting  the  eloquent  tongue  that  should 
have  set  them  off!  You  have  gratified  me  with  liking  my 
meeting  with  Dodd.*  For  the  Malvolio  story,  the  thing  is  be- 
come in  verity  a  sad  task,  and  I  eke  it  out  with  anything.  If 
I  could  slip  out  of  it  1  should  be  happy,  but  our  chief  reputed 
assistants  have  forsaken  us.  The  Opium-eater  crossed  us 
once  with  a  dazzling  path,  and  hath  as  suddenly  left  us  dark- 
ling ;  and,  in  short,  I  shall  go  on  from  dull  to  worse,  because 
I  cannot  resist  the  booksellers'  importunity — the  old  plea,  you 
know,  of  authors  ;  but,  I  believe,  on  my  part,  sincere.  Hartley 
I  do  not  so  often  see,  but  I  never  see  him  in  unwelcome  hour. 
I  thoroughly  love  and  honour  him.  I  send  you  a  frozen  epistle, 
but  it  is  winter  and  dead  time  of  the  year  with  me.  May 
Heaven  keep  something  like  spring  and  summer  up  with  you, 
strengthen  your  eyes,  and  make  mine  a  little  lighter  to  en- 
counter with  them,  as  I  hope  they  shall  yet  and  again  before 
all  are  closed. 

"  Yours,  with  every  kind  remembrance, 

"  C.  L. 
"  I  had  almost  forgot  to  say  I  think  you  thoroughly  right 
about  presentation  copies.     I  should  like  to  see  you  print  a 
book  I  should  grudge  to  purchase  for  its  size.     Hang  me,  but 
I  would  have  it,  though  !" 

The  following  letter,  containing  the  germe  of  tlie  well-known 
"  Dissertation  on  Roast  Pig,"  was  addressed  to  Coleridge,  who 
had  received  a  pig  as  a  present,  and  attributed  it  erroneously 
lo  Lamb. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Dear  C. — It  gives  me  great  satisfaction  to  hear  that  the 
pig  turned  out  so  well — they  are   interesting   creatures  at  a 

♦   See  the  account  of  Iho  meeting  hotweeii  Uodil  and  Jem  White,  in  Ella's 
Essay  "  On  some  of  the  Old  Actors,"  vol.  ii.,  p.  151. 
17* 


198  LETTER    TO    COLERIDGE. 

certain  age — what  a  pity  such  buds  should  blow  out  into  the 
maturity  of  rank  bacon  !  You  had  all  some  of  the  crackling — 
and  brain  sauce — did  you  remember  to  rub  it  with  butter,  and 
gently  dredge  it  a  little,  just  before  the  crisis  ?  Did  the  eyes 
come  away  kindly,  with  no  (Edipean  avulsion?  Was  the 
crackling  the  colour  of  the  ripe  pomegranate  ?  Had  you  no 
cursed  compliment  of  boiled  neck  of  mutton  before  it,  to 
blunt  the  edge  of  delicate  desire?  Did  you  flesh  maiden 
teeth  in  it  ?  Not  that  I  sent  the  pig,  nor  can  form  the  remo- 
test guess  what  part   O could   play  in  the  business.     I 

never  knew  him  give  anything  away  in  my  life.  He  would 
not  begin  with  strangers.  I  suspect  the  pig,  after  all,  was 
meant  for  n\e  ;  but,  at  the  unlucky  juncture  of  time  being  ab- 
sent, the  present  somehow  went  round  to  Highgate.  To  con- 
fess an  honest  truth,  a  pig  is  one  of  those  things  I  could  never 
think  of  sending  away.  Teals,  widgeons,  snipes,  barn-door 
fowl,  ducks,  geese — your  tame  villalio  things — Welsh  mutton, 
collars  of  brawn,  sturgeon,  fresh  or  pickled,  your  potted  char, 
Swiss  cheeses,  French  pies,  early  grapes,  muscadines,  I  impart 
as  freely  unto  my  friends  as  to  myself.  They  are  but  self- 
extended  ;  but  pardon  me  if  I  stop  somewhere — where  the 
fine  feeling  of  benevolence  giveth  a  higher  smack  than  the 
sensual  rarity,  there  my  friends  (or  any  good  man)  may  com- 
mand me ;  but  pigs  are  pigs,  and  I  myself  therein  am  nearest 
to  myself.  Nay,  I  should  think  it  an  affront,  an  undervaluing 
done  to  Nature  who  bestowed  such  a  boon  upon  me,  if,  in  a 
churlish  mood,  I  parted  with  the  precious  gift.  One  of  the 
bitterest  pangs  I  ever  felt  of  remorse  was  when  a  child — my 
kind  old  aunt  had  strained  her  pocket-strings  to  bestow  a 
sixpenny  whole  plumcake  upon  me.  In  my  way  home 
through  the  borough  I  met  a  venerable  old  man,  not  a  mendi- 
cant, but  thereabout ;  a  look-beggar,  not  a  verbal  petitionist ; 
and  in  the  coxcombry  of  taught-charity  I  gave  away  the  cake 
to  him.  I  walked  on  a  little  in  all  the  pride  of  an  evangelical 
peacock,  when,  of  a  sudden,  my  old  aunt's  kindness  crossed 
me  ;  the  sum  it  was  to  her  ;  the  pleasure  she  had  a  right  to 
expect  that  I,  not  the  old  impostor,  should  take  in  eating  her 
cake  ;  the  cursed  ingratitude  by  which,  under  the  colour  of  a 
Christian  virtue,  I  had  frustrated  her  cherished  purpose.  I 
sobbed,  wept,  and  took  it  to  heart  so  grievously,  that  I  think 
I  never  suffered  the  like — and  I  was  right.  It  was  a  piece  of 
unfeeling  hypocrisy,  and  proved  a  lesson  to  me  ever  after. 
The  cake  has  long  been  masticated,  consigned  to  dunghill 
with  the  ashes  of  that  unseasonable  pauper. 

"  But  when  Providence,  who  is  better  to  us  all  than  our 
aunts,  gives  me  a  pig,  remembering  my  temptation  and  my 


LETTER    TO    FIELD.  199 

fall,  1  shall  endeavour  to  act  towards  it  more  in  the  spirit  of 
the  donor's  purpose. 

"Yours  (short  of  pig)  to  command  in  everything, 

"  C.  L." 

In  the  summer  of  1822  Lamb  and  his  sister  visited  Paris. 
The  following  is  a  hasty  letter  addressed  to  Field  on  his  re- 
turn. 

TO    MR.    BARRON    FIELD. 

"  My  dear  F. — I  scribble  hastily  at  office.  Frank  wants 
my  letter  presently.  I  and  sister  are  just  returned  from  Paris  ! ! 
AVe  have  eaten  frogs.  It  has  been  such  a  treat!  Frogs  are 
the  nicest  little  delicate  things — rabbity-flavoured  !  Imagine 
a  Lilliputian  rabbit  !  They  fricassee  them  ;  but,  in  my  mind, 
dressed,  seethed,  plain,  with  parsley  and  butter,  would  have 
been  the  decision  of  Apicius.  Paris  is  a  glorious,  picturesque 
old  city.  London  looks  mean  and  new  to  it,  as  the  town  of 
Washington  would  seen  after  it.  But  they  have  no  St.  Paul's 
or  Westminster  Abbey.  The  Seine,  so  much  despised  by 
Cockneys,  is  exactly  the  size  to  run  through  a  magnificent 
street ;  palaces  a  mile  long  on  one  side,  lofty  Edinbro'  stone 
(oh  the  glorious  antiquities !)  houses  on  the  other.  The 
Thames  disunites  London  and  Southwark.  I  had  Talma  to 
supper  with  me.  He  has  picked  up,  as  I  believe,  an  authen- 
tic portrait  of  Shakspeare.  He  paid  a  broker  about  40/.  Eng- 
lish for  it.  It  is  painted  on  the  one  half  of  a  pair  of  bellows 
— a  lovely  picture,  corresponding  with  the  folio  head.  The 
bellows  has  old  carved  wings  round  it,  and  round  the  visnomy 
is  inscribed,  as  near  as  I  remember,  not  divided  into  rhyme — 
I  found  out  the  rhyme — 

Whom  have  we  here 
Stuck  on  this  bellows 
But  the  prince  of  good  fellows, 
Willy  Shakspeare  ? 

At  top — 

Oh  base  and  coward  luck  ! 
To  be  here  stuck. 

POINS. 

At  bottom — 

Nay !  rather  a  glorious  lot  is  to  him  assign 'd. 
Who,  like  the  Almighty,  rides  upon  the  wind. 

ItTOL. 

"  This  is  all  in  old  carved  wooden  letters.     The  counte- 
nance smiling,  sweet,  and   intellectual  beyond  measure,  even 
I       as  he  was  immeasurable.     It  may  be  a  forgery.     They  laugh 

I  3 


200  LETTERS   TO    BARTON. 

at  me,  and  tell  me  Ireland  is  in  Paris,  and  has  been  putting 
off  a  portrait  of  the  Black  Prince.  How  far  old  wood  may- 
be imitated  I  cannot  say.  Ireland  was  not  found  out  by  his 
parchments,  but  by  his  poetry.  I  am  confident  no  painter  on 
either  side  the  channel  could  have  painted  anything  near  like 
the  face  I  saw.  Again,  would  such  a  painter  and  forger  have 
taken  401.  lor  a  thing,  if  authentic,  worth  4000/.  ?  Talma 
is  not  in  the  secret,  for  he  had  not  even  found  out  the  rhymes 
in  the  first  inscription.  He  is  coming  over  with  it,  and,  my 
life  to  Southey's  Thalaba,  it  will  gain  universal  faith. 

"  The  letter  is  wanted,  and  I  am  wanted.  Imagine  the 
blank  filled  up  with  all  kind  things. 

"  Our  joint  hearty  remembrances  to  both  of  you.  Yours, 
as  ever, 

"C.  Lamb. 

"  Sept.  22,  1822." 

Soon  after  Lamb's  return  from  Paris  he  became  acquainted 
with  the  poet  of  the  Quakers,  Bernard  Barton,  who,  like  him- 
self, was  engaged  in  the  drudgery  of  figures.  The  pure  and 
gentle  tone  of  the  poems  of  his  new  acquaintance  was  wel- 
come to  Lamb,  who  had  more  sympathy  with  the  truth  of  na- 
ture in  modest  guise  than  in  the  affected  fury  of  Lord  Byron, 
or  the  dreamy  extravagances  of  Shelley.  Lamb  had  written 
in  "  Elia"  of  the  Society  of  Friends  with  the  freedom  of  one 
who,  with  great  respect  for  the  principles  of  the  founders  of 
their  faith,  had  little  in  common  with  a  sect  who  shunned  the 
pleasures  while  they  mingled  in  the  business  of  the  world ; 
and  a  friendly  expostulation  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Barton  led  to 
such  cordial  excuses  as  completely  won  the  heart  of  the 
Quaker  bard.  Some  expression  which  Lamb  let  fall  at  their 
meeting  in  London,  from  which  Mr.  Barton  had  supposed  that 
Lamb  objected  to  a  Quaker's  writing  poetry  as  inconsistent 
with  his  creed,  induced  Mr.  Barton  to  write  to  Lamb  on  his  re- 
turn to  Woodbridge,  who  replied  as  follows  : — 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"India  House,  11th  Sept.,  1822. 
"  Dear  Sir — You  have  misapprehended  me  sadly  if  you 
suppose  that  I  meant  to  impute  any  inconsistency  in  your 
writing  poetry  with  your  religious  profession.  I  do  not  re- 
member what  I  said,  but  it  was  spoken  sportively,  I  am  sure 
— one  of  my  levities,  which  you  are  not  so  used  to  as  my 
older  friends.  I  probably  was  thinking  of  the  light  in  which 
your  so  indulging  yourself  would  appear  to  Quakers,  and  put 
their  objection  into  my  own  mouth.     I  would  eat  my  words 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  201 

(provided  they  should  be  written  on  not  very  coarse  paper) 
rather  than  1  would  throw  cold  water  upon  your,  and  my  once, 
harmless  occupation. 

"  I  have  read  Napoleon  and  the  rest  with  delight.  I  like 
them  for  what  they  are  and  for  what  they  are  not.  I  have  sick- 
ened on  the  modern  rhodomontade  and  Byronism,  and  your 
plain  Quakerish  beauty  has  captivated  me.  It  is  all  wholesome 
cates,  ay,  and  toothsome  too,  and  withal  Quakerish.  If  I 
were  George  Fox,  and  George  Fox  licenser  of  the  press,  they 
should  have  my  absolute  imprimatur.  I  hope  I  have  removed 
the  impression. 

*'  I  am,  like  you,  a  prisoner  to  the  desk.  I  have  been 
chained  to  that  galley  thirty  years  ;  a  long  shot.  I  have  al- 
most grown  to  the  wood.  If  no  imaginative^  I  am  sure  I  am 
2i  jigurative  writer.  Do  Friends  allow  puns  ?  verbal  equivoca- 
tions? they  are  unjustly  accused  of  it,  and  I  did  my  best  in 
the  '  Imperfect  Sympathies'  to  vindicate  them.  I  am  very 
tired  of  clerking  it,  but  have  no  remedy.  Did  you  see  a  son- 
net to  this  purpose  in  the  Examiner  ? 

'  Who  first  invented  work,  and  bound  the  free 
And  holyday  rejoicing  spirit  down 
To  the  ever-haunting  importunity 
Of  business,  in  the  green  fields  and  the  town, 
To  plough,  loom,  aiivii,  spade;  and  oh,  most  sad, 
To  that  dry  drudgery  at  the  desk's  dead  wood? 
Who  but  the  being  unbless'd,  alien  from  good, 
Sabbathless  Satan  !  he  who  his  unglad 
Task  ever  plies  mid  rotatory  burnings. 
That  round  and  round  incalculably  reel ; 
Vox  wrath  Divine  hath  made  him  like  a  wheel 
In  that  red  realtn  from  which  are  no  returnings; 
Where,  toiling  and  turmoilmg,  ever  and  aye. 
He  and  his  thoughts  keep  pensive  working-day.' 

"  I  fancy  the  sentiment  expressed  above  will  be  nearly  your 
own.  The  expression  of  it,  probably,  would  not  so  well  suit 
with  a  follower  of  John  Woolman.  But  I  do  not  know  wheth- 
er diabolism  is  a  part  of  your  creed,  or  where,  indeed,  to  find 
an  exposition  of  your  creed  at  all.  In  feelings  and  matters 
not  dogmatical,  I  hope  I  am  half  a  Quaker.  Believe  me,  with 
great  respect,  yours, 

"C.  Lamb. 

"  I  shall  always  be  happy  to  see  or  hear  from  you." 

Encouraged  by  Lamb's  kindness,  Mr.  Barton  continued  the 
correspondence,  which  became  the  most  frrqiuMii  in  which 
Lamb  bad  tmgaged  for  many  years.  The  foIU)wing  letter  is 
in  acknowledgment  of  a  jiublicalion  of  Mr.  Barton's,  chiefly 
directed  to  oppose  the  theories  and  tastes  of  Lord  Byron  and 
his  friends. 

13 


202  LETTERS  TO  BARTON. 

TO  BERNRAD  BARTON. 

East  India  House,  9th  Oct.,  1822. 
"  Dear  Sir — I  am  ashamed  not  sooner  to  have  acknowledged 
your  letter  and  poem.  I  think  the  latter  very  temperate,  very 
serious,  and  very  seasonable.  I  do  not  think  it  will  convert 
the  club  at  Pisa,  neither  do  I  think  it  will  satisfy  the  bigots 
on  our  side  the  water.  Something  like  a  parody  on  the  song 
of  Ariel  would  please  them  better: 

*  Full  fathom  five  the  Atheist  lies, 
Of  his  bones  are  hell-dice  made.' 

"  I  want  time  and  fancy  to  fill  up  the  rest.  I  sincerely 
sympathize  with  you  in  your  confinement.  Of  time,  health, 
and  riches,  the  first  in  order  is  not  last  in  excellence.  Riches 
are  chiefly  good,  because  they  give  us  time.  What  a  weight 
of  wearisome  prison-hours  have  I  to  look  back  and  forward 
to,  as  quite  cut  out  of  life  ;  and  the  sting  of  the  thing  is,  that 
for  six  hours  every  day  I  have  no  business  which  I  could  not 
contract  into  two,  if  they  would  let  me  work  task-work. 

*  *  *  *■  :^  * 

"  I  am  returning  a  poor  letter.  I  was  formerly  a  great 
scribbler  in  that  way,  but  my  hand  is  out  of  order.  If  1  said 
my  head  too,  I  should  not  be  very  much  out,  but  I  will  tell 
no  tales  of  myself;  I  will  therefore  end  (after  my  best  thanks, 
with  a  hope  to  see  you  again  some  time  in  London),  begging 
you  to  accept  this  letteret  for  a  letter — a  leveret  makes  a  bet- 
ter present  than  a  grown  hare,  and  short  troubles  (as  the  old 
excuse  goes)  are  best. 

"  I  remain,  dear  sir,  yours  truly, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  next  letter  will  speak  for  itself. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"23d  Dec,  1822. 
"  Dear  Sir — I  have  been  so  distracted  with  business  and 
one  thing  or  other,  I  have  not  had  a  quiet  quarter  of  an  hour 
for  epistolary  purposes.  Christmas,  too,  is  come,  which  al- 
ways puts  a  rattle  into  my  morning  scull.  It  is  a  visiting, 
unquiet,  unquakerish  season.  I  get  more  and  more  in  love  with 
solitude,  and  proportionately  hampered  with  company.  I  hope 
you  have  some  holydays  at  this  period.  1  have  one  day — 
Christmas  day ;  alas  !  too  few  to  commemorate  the  season. 
All  work  and  no  play  dulls  me.  Company  is  not  play,  but 
many  times  hard  work.  To  play  is  for  a  man  to  do  what  he 
pleases,  or  to  do  nothing — to  go  about  soothing  his  particular 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  203 

fancies.  I  have  lived  to  a  time  of  life  to  have  outlived  the 
good  hours,  the  nine  o'clock  suppers,  with  a  bright  hour  or 
two  to  clear  up  in  afterward.  Now  you  cannot  get  tea  before 
that  hour,  and  then  sit  gaping,  music-bothered,  perhaps,  till 
half  past  twelve  brings  up  the  tray ;  and  what  you  steal  of 
convivial  enjoyment  after  is  heavily  paid  for  in  the  disquiet 
of  to-morrow's  head. 

"  I  am  pleased  with  your  liking  '  John  Woodvil,'  and 
amused  with  your  knowledge  of  our  drama  being  confined  to 
Shakspeare  and  Miss  Baillie.  What  a  world  of  fine  territory 
between  Land's  End  and  Johnny  Groat's  have  you  missed 
traversing!  I  could  almost  envy  you  to  have  so  much  to 
read.  I  feel  as  if  I  had  read  all  the  books  I  want  to  read. 
Oh  !  to  forget  Fielding,  Steele,  &c.,  Asc,  and  read  'em  new  ! 

"Can  you  tell  me  a  likely  place  where  I  could  pick  up, 
cheap.  Fox's  Journal  ?  There  are  no  Quaker  circulating  li- 
braries !     Elwood,  too,  I  must  have.     I  rather  grudge  that 

S has  tnken  up  the  history  of  your  people  ;  I  am  afraid 

he  will  put  in  some  levity.  I  am  afraid  I  am  not  quite  exempt 
from  that  fault  in  certain  magazine  articles,  where  I  have  in- 
troduced mention  of  them.  Were  they  to  do  again,  I  would 
reform  them.  Why  should  not  you  write  a  poetical  account 
of  your  old  worthies,  deducing  them  from  Fox  to  Woolman  ? 
but  I  remember  you  did  talk  of  something  of  that  kind,  as  a 
counterpart  to  the  '  Ecclesiastical  Sketches.'  But  would  not 
a  poem  be  more  consecutive  than  a  string  of  sonnets  ?  You 
have  no  martyrs  quite  to  the  Jire,  I  think,  among  you  ;  but 
plenty  of  heroic  confessors,  spirit-martyrs,  lamb-lions.  Think 
of  it ;  it  would  be  better  than  a  series  of  sonnets  on  *  Eminent 
Bankers.'  I  like  a  hit  at  our  way  of  life,  though  it  does  well 
for  me,  better  than  anything  short  of  all  one's  time  to  one's 
self;  for  which  alone  1  rankle  with  envy  at  the  rich.  Books 
are  good,  and  pictures  are  good,  and  money  to  buy  them  there- 
fore good,  but  to  buy  time !  in  other  words,  life ! 

" 'I'he  'Compliments  of  the  Time'  to  you  should  end  my 
letter;  to  a  Friend,  I  suppose  I  must  say  the  'Sincerity  of 
the  Season  :'  I  hope  they  both  mean  the  same.  With  excuses 
for  this  hastily-penned  note,  believe  me,  with  great  respect, 

"C.  Lamb." 

In  this  winter  Mr.  Walter  Wilson,  one  of  the  friends  of 
Lamb's  youth,  applied  to  him  for  information  respecting  De 
Foe,  whose  life  he  was  about  to  write.  The  renewal  of  the 
acquaintance  was  very  pleasant  to  Latnh,  who  many  years 
before  used  to  take  daily  walks  with  Wilson,  and  to  call  him 
"brother."     The  following  is  Lamb's  reply. 


204  LETTERS    TO    WILSON, 


TO    MR.    WALTER    WILSOX. 


"  E.  I.  H.,  16th  December,  1822. 

''  Dear  Wilson — Lightning  1  was  going  to  call  you.  You 
must  have  thought  me  negligent  in  not  answering  your  letter 
sooner.  But  I  have  a  habit  of  never  writing  letters  but  at  the 
office  ;  'tis  so  much  time  cribbed  out  of  the  Company  ;  and  I 
am  but  just  got  out  of  the  thick  of  a  tea-sale,  in  which  most 
of  the  entry  of  notes,  deposites,  &;c.,  usually  falls  to  my  share. 

"  I  have  nothing  of  De  Foe's  but  two  or  three  novels,  and 
the  '  Plague  History.'  I  can  give  you  no  information  about 
him.  As  a  slight  general  character  of  what  I  remember  of 
them  (for  1  have  not  looked  into  them  latterly),  I  would  say 
that,  in  the  appearance  of  truth,  in  all  the  incidents  and  con- 
versations that  occur  in  them,  they  exceed  any  works  of  fic- 
tion I  am  acquainted  with.  It  is  perfect  illusion.  The  author 
never  appears  in  these  self-narratives  (for  so  they  ought  to  be 
called,  or  rather  autobiographies),  but  the  narrator  chains  us 
down  to  an  implicit  belief  in  everything  he  says.  There  is 
all  the  minute  detail  of  a  logbook  in  it.  Dates  are  painfully 
pressed  upon  the  memory.  Facts  are  repeated  over  and  over 
in  varying  phrases,  till  you  cannot  choose  but  believe  them. 
It  is  like  reading  evidence  in  a  court  of  justice.  So  anxious 
the  story-teller  seems  that  the  truth  should  be  clearly  com- 
prehended, that  when  he  has  told  us  a  matter-of-fact  or  a  mo- 
tive, in  a  line  or  two  farther  down  he  repeats  it,  with  his  fa- 
vourite figure  of  speech,  '  I  say,'  so  and  so,  though  he  had 
made  it  abundantly  plain  before.  This  is  in  imitation  of  the 
common  people's  way  of  speaking,  or  rather  of  the  way  in 
which  they  are  addressed  by  a  master  or  mistress,  who  wishes 
to  impress  something  upon  their  memories,  and  has  a  wonder- 
ful effect  upon  matter-of-fact  readers.  Indeed,  it  is  to  such 
principally  that  he  writes.  His  style  is  everywhere  beauti- 
ful, but  plain  and  homely.  Robinson  Crusoe  is  delightful  to 
all  ranks  and  classes,  but  it  is  easy  to  see  that  it  is  written  in 
phraseology  peculiarly  adapted  to  the  lower  conditions  of 
readers ;  hence  it  is  an  especial  favourite  with  seafaring  men, 
poor  boys,  servant-maids,  &lc.  His  novels  are  capital  kitch- 
en-reading, while  they  are  worthy,  from  their  deep  interest, 
to  find  a  shelf  in  the  libraries  of  the  wealthiest  and  the  most 
learned.  His  passion  for  matter-of-fact  narrative  sometimes 
betrayed  him  into  a  long  relation  of  common  incidents,  which 
might  happen  to  any  man,  and  have  no  interest  but  the  intense 
appearance  of  truth  in  them  to  recommend  them.  The  whole 
latter  half  or  two  thirds  of  '  Colonel  Jack'  is  of  this  descrip- 
tion. The  beginning  of  '  Colonel  Jack'  is  the  most  affecting 
natural  picture  of  a  young  thief  that  was  ever  drawn.     His 


LETTERS    TO    BARTOiV.  205 

losing  the  stolen  money  in  the  hollow  of  a  tree,  and  finding  it 
again  when  he  was  in  despair,  and  then  being  in  equal  dis- 
tress at  not  knowing  how  to  dispose  of  it,  and  several  similar 
touches  in  the  early  history  of  the  colonel,  evince  a  deep  knowl- 
edge of  human  nature  ;  and,  putting  out  of  question  the  supe- 
rior romantic  interest  of  the  latter,  in  my  mind,  very  much  ex- 
ceed Crusoe.  '  Roxana'  (first  edition)  is  the  next  in  interest, 
though  he  left  out  the  best  part  of  it  in  subsequent  editions 
from  a  foolish  hypercriticism  of  his  friend  Southerne.  But 
'Moll  Flanders,'  the  *  Account  of  the  Plague,'  &.c.,  are  all  of 
one  family,  and  have  the  same  stamp  of  character.  Believe 
me,  with  friendly  recollections,  Brother  (as  I  used  to  call 
you), 

"  Yours, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

How  bitterly  Lamb  felt  his  East  India  bondage  has  abun- 
dantly appeared  from  his  letters  during  many  years.  Yet  there 
never  was  wanting  a  secret  consciousness  of  the  benefits 
which  it  ensured  for  him,  the  precious  independence  which  he 
won  by  his  hours  of  toil,  and  the  freedom  of  his  mind,  to  work 
only  "  at  its  own  sweet  will,"  which  his  confinement  to  the 
desk  obtained.  This  sense  of  the  blessings  which  a  fixed  in- 
come, derived  from  ascertained  duties,  confers,  broke  out  on 
the  wish  of  his  fellow-labourer,  Bernard  Barton,  to  cast  off*  the 
trammels  of  the  banking-house,  and  rely  on  literature  for  sub- 
sistence ;  and  in  the  generous  dissuasion  of  his  friend  from  an 
act  of  folly,  which  he  had  perhaps  been  tempted  to  contem- 
plate by  Lamb's  own  complainings,  made  a  noble  amends  to 
his  leger  for  all  his  unjust  reproaches.  The  references  to 
the  booksellers  have  the  colouring  of  fantastical  exaggeration, 
by  which  he  delighted  to  give  effect  to  the  immediate  feeling ; 
but,  making  allowance  for  this  mere  play  of  fancy,  how  just  is 
the  following  advice — how  wholesome  for  every  youth  who 
hesitates  whether  he  shall  abandon  the  certain  reward  of 
plodding  industry  for  the  splendid  miseries  of  authorship  !* 

♦  It  is  singular  that,  some  years  before,  Mr.  Barton  had  received  similar  ad- 
vice from  a  very  different  poet — Lord  Byron.  As  the  letter  has  never  been 
published,  and  it  may  be  interesting  to  compare  the  expressions  of  two  men 
80  different  on  the  same  subject,  1  subjom  it  here  : — 

"TO    BERNARD    BARTON,  ESQ. 

"  St.  James'sstree(,  June  1,  1812. 
"  Sir — The  most  satisfactory  answer  to  the  concluding  part  of  your  letter 
IS,  that  Mr.  Murray  will  republish  your  volume  if  you  still  retain  your  incli 
nation  for  the  experiment,  which,  I  trust,  will  be  siicccssfui.  Some  weeks  age 
my  fnend  Mr.  Rogers  showed  me  some  of  the  stanzas  in  MS.,  and  I  then  ex- 
pressed my  opinion  of  their  merit,  which  a  further  perusal  of  the  prmted 
18 


206  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"9th  January,  1823. 

**  Throw  yourself  on  the  world  without  any  rational  plan  of 
support  beyond  what  the  chance  employ  of  booksellers  would 
afford  you  ! 

"  Throw  yourself  rather,  my  dear  sir,  from  the  steep  Tar- 
peian  rock,  slap-dash  headlong  upon  iron  spikes.  If  you  have 
but  five  consolatory  minutes  between  the  desk  and  the  bed, 
make  much  of  them,  and  live  a  century  in  them  rather  than 
turn  slave  to  the  booksellers.  They  are  Turks  and  Tartars 
when  they  have  poor  authors  at  their  beck.  Hitherto  you  have 
been  at  arm's  length  from  them.  Come  not  within  their  grasp. 
I  have  known  many  authors  want  for  bread,  some  repining, 
others  enjoying  the  blessed  security  of  a  spunging-house,  all 
agreeing  they  had  rather  have  been  tailors,  weavers — what 
not?  rather  than  the  things  they  were.  I  have  known  some 
starved,  some  to  go  mad,  one  dear  friend  literally  dying  in 
a  workhouse.  You  know  not  what  a  rapacious  set  these 
booksellers  are.  Ask  even  Southey,  who  (a  single  case  al- 
most) has  made  a  fortune  by  book-drudgery,  what  he  has  found 
them.  Oh,  you  know  not,  may  you  never  know,  the  miseries 
of  subsisting  by  authorship !     'Tis  a  pretty  appendage  to  a 

volume  has  given  me  no  reason  to  revoke.  I  mention  this,  as  it  may  not  be 
disagreeable  to  you  to  learn  that  I  entertained  a  very  favourable  opinion  of 
your  powers  before  I  was  aware  that  such  sentiments  were  reciprocal.  Wa- 
ving your  obliging  expressions  as  to  my  own  productions,  for  which  I  thank  you 
very  sincerely,  and  assure  you  that  I  think  not  lightly  of  the  praise  of  one 
whose  approbation  is  valuable,  will  you  allow  me  to  talk  to  you  candidly,  not 
critically,  on  the  subject  of  yours  ?  You  will  not  suspect  me  of  a  wish  to  dis- 
courage, since  I  pointed  out  to  the  publisher  the  propriety  of  complying  with 
your  wishes.  I  think  more  highly  of  your  poetical  talents  than  it  would  per- 
haps gratify  you  to  have  expressed  ;  for  I  believe,  from  what  I  observe  of  your 
mind,  that  you  are  above  flattery.  To  come  to  the  point,  you  deserve  suc- 
cess ;  but  we  knew  before  Addison  wrote  his  Cato  that  desert  does  not  always 
command  it.     But  suppose  it  attained, 

"  *  You  know  what  ills  the  author's  life  assail, 
Toil,  envy,  want,  the  patron,  and  the  jail.' 

Do  not  renounce  writing,  but  never  trust  entirely  to  authorship.  If  you  have  a 
profession,  retain  it ;  it  will  be  like  Prior's  fellowship,  a  last  and  sore  resource. 
Compare  Mr.  Rogers  with  other  authors  of  the  day  ;  assuredly  he  is  among 
the  first  of  living  poets,  but  is  it  to  that  he  owes  his  station  in  society,  and  his 
intimacy  in  the  best  circles  ? — no,  it  is  to  his  prudence  and  respectability.  The 
world  (a  bad  one,  I  own)  courts  him  because  he  has  no  occasion  to  court  it. 
He  is  a  poet,  nor  is  he  less  so  because  he  is  something  more.  I  am  not  sorry 
to  hear  that  you  were  not  tempted  by  the  vicinity  of  Capel  Loffl,  Esq. — 
though,  if  he  had  done  for  you  what  he  has  for  the  Bloomfields,  I  should  never 
have  laughed  at  his  rage  for  patronising.  But  a  truly  well  constituted  mind 
will  ever  be  independent.  That  you  may  be  so  is  my  sincere  wish  ;  and  if 
others  think  as  well  of  your  poetry  as  I  do,  you  will  have  no  cause  to  complain 
of  your  readers.    Believe  me, 

"  Your  obliged  and  obedient  servant 

"  Byron.** 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  207 

situation  like  yours  or  mine  ;  but  a  slavery,  worse  than  all 
slavery,  to  be  a  bookseller's  dependant,  to  drudge  your  brains 
for  pots   of  ale  and  breasts  of  mutton,  to  change  your  free 

THOUGHTS  and  VOLUiNTARY  NUMBERS /or  UngracioUS  TASKWORK. 

'I'he  booksellers  hate  us.  The  reason  I  lake  to  be,  that  con- 
trary to  other  trades,  in  which  the  master  gets  all  the  credit 
(a  jeweller  or  silversmith,  for  instance),  and  the  journeyman, 
who  really  does  the  fine  work,  is  in  the  background  :  in  our 
work  the  world  gives  all  the  credit  to  us,  whom  they  consider 
as  their  journeymen,  and  therefore  do  they  hate  us,  and  cheat 
us,  and  oppress  us,  and  would  wring  the  blood  of  us  out,  to 
put  another  sixpence  in  their  mechanic  pouches  ! 

****** 

"  Keep  to  your  bank,  and  the  bank  will  keep  you.  Trust 
not  to  the  public  ;  you  may  hang,  starve,  drown  yourself  for 
anything  that  worthy  personage  cares.  I  bless  every  star,  that 
Providence,  not  seeing  good  to  make  me  independent,  has  seen 
it  next  good  to  settle  me  upon  the  stable  foundation  of  Leaden- 
hall,  Sit  down,  good  B.  B.,  in  the  banking-office  ;  what !  is 
there  not  from  six  to  eleven,  i'.m.,  six  days  in  the  week,  and  is 
there  not  all  Sunday  ?  Fy,  what  a  superfluity  of  man's  time, 
if  you  could  think  so !  Enough  for  relaxation,  mirth,  con- 
verse, poetry,  good  thoughts,  quiet  thoughts.  Oh  the  cor- 
roding, torturing^,  tormenting  thoughts  that  disturb  the  brain  of 
the  unlucky  wight  who  must  draw  upon  it  for  daily  sustenance  ! 
Henceforth  I  retract  all  my  fond  complaints  of  mercantile  em- 
ployment ;  look  upon  them  as  lover's  quarrels.  I  was  but 
half  in  earnest.  Welcome  dead  timber  of  the  desk,  that  gives 
me  life.  A  little  grumbling  is  a  wholesome  medicine  for  the 
spleen,  but  in  my  inner  heart  do  I  approve  and  embrace  this 
our  close  but  unharassing  way  of  life.  I  am  quite  serious. 
If  you  can  send  me  Fox,  I  will  not  keep  it  six  weeks,  and  will 
return  it,  with  warm  thanks  to  yourself  and  friend,  without 
blot  or  dog's-ear.     You  will  much  oblige  me  by  this  kindness. 

"  Yours  truly, 

"C.  Lamb." 

Lamb  thus  communicated  to  Mr.  Barton  his  prosecution  of 
his  researches  into  Primitive  Quakerism. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  February,  1823. 
*'  My  dear  Sir — I  have  read  quite  through  the  ponderous 
folio  of  George  Fox.     Pray  how  may  I  return  it  to  Mr.  Skew- 
ell,  at  Ipswich  ?     I  fear  to  send  such  a  treasure  by  a  stage- 
coach ;  not  that  I  am  afraid  of  the  coachman  or  the  guard 


208  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

reading  it^  but  it  might  be  lost.  Can  you  put  me  in  a  way  of 
sending  it  safely  ?  The  kind-hearted  owner  trusted  it  to  me 
for  six  months ;  I  think  I  was  about  as  many  days  in  getting 
through  it,  and  I  do  not  think  that  I  skipped  a  word  of  it.  I 
have  quoted  G.  F.  in  my  '  Quaker  Meeting,'  as  having  said 
he  was  '  lifted  up  in  spirit'  (which  I  felt  at  the  time  to  be  not 
a  Quaker  phrase),  '  and  the  judge  and  the  jury  were  as  dead 
men  under  his  feet.'  I  find  no  such  words  in  his  journal,  and 
I  did  not  get  them  from  Sewell,  and  the  latter  sentence  I  am 
sure  I  did  not  mean  to  invent ;  I  must  have  put  some  other 
Quaker's  words  into  his  mouth.  Is  it  a  fatality  in  me,  that 
everything  I  touch  turns  into  a  *  a  lye  V  I  once  quoted  two 
lines  from  a  translation  of  Dante,  which  Hazlitt  very  greatly 
admired,  and  quoted  in  a  book  as  proof  of  the  stupendous 
power  of  that  poet,  but  no  such  lines  are  to  be  found  in  the 
translation,  which  has  been  searched  for  the  purpose.  I 
must  have  dreamed  them,  for  I  am  quite  certain  I  did  not 
forge  them  knowingly.     What  a  misfortune  to  have  a  lying 

memory  !     Your  description  of  Mr.  M 's  place  makes  me 

long  for  a  pippin,  and  some  carraways,  and  a  cup  of  sack,  in 
his  orchard,  when  the  sweets  of  the  night  came  in.     Farewell. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1823,  the  "  Essays  of  Elia," 
collected  in  a  volume,  were  published  by  Messrs.  Taylor  and 
Hessey,  who  had  become  the  proprietors  of  the  "  London 
Magazine."  The  book  met  with  a  rapid  sale,  while  the  mag- 
azine in  which  its  contents  had  appeared  declined.  The  an- 
ecdote of  the  three  Quakers  gravely  walking  out  of  the  inn 
where  they  had  taken  tea  on  the  road,  on  an  extortionate  de- 
mand, one  after  the  other,  without  paying  anything,*  had  ex- 
cited some  gentle  remonstrance  on  the  part  of  Barton's  sister, 
to  which  Lamb  thus  replied. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  Dear  Sir — The  approbation  of  my  little  book  by  your 
sister  is  very  pleasing  to  me.  The  Quaker  incident  did  not 
happen  to  me,  but  to  Carlisle  the  surgeon,  from  whose 
mouth  I  have  twice  heard  it,  at  an  interval  of  ten  or  twelve 
years,  with  little  or  no  variation,  and  have  given  it  exactly 
as  I  could  remember  it.  The  gloss  which  your  sister  or 
you  have  put  upon  it  does  not  strike  me  as  correct.  Car- 
lisle drew  no  inference  from  it  against  the  honesty  of  the 
Quakers,  but  only  in  favour  of  their  surprising  coolness ;  that 
they  should  be  capable  of  committing  a  good  joke,  with  an  ut- 

*  See  Elia's  "  Imperfect  Sympathies,"  vol.  ii.,  p.  73. 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  209 

ter  insensibility  to  its  being  any  jest  at  all.  I  have  reason  to 
believe  in  the  truth  of  it,  because,  as  I  have  said,  I  heard  him 
repeat  it  without  variation  at  such  an  interval.  The  story 
loses  sadly  in  print,  for  Carlisle  is  the  best  storyteller  I  ever 
heard.  The  idea  of  the  discovery  of  roasting  pigs  I  also 
borrowed  from  my  friend  Manning,  and  am  willing  to  confess 
both  my  plagiarisms.  Should  fate  so  order  it  that  you  shall 
be  in  town  with  your  sister,  mine  bids  me  say  that  she  shall 

have  great  pleasure  in  being  introduced  to  her. 

****** 

"  They  have  dragged  me  again  into  the  magazine,  but  I 
feel  the  spirit  of  the  thing  in  my  own  mind  quite  gone. 
'  Some  brains'  (I  think  Ben  Jonson  says  it)  '  will  endure  but 
one  skinning.'  We  are  about  to  have  an  inundation  of  poetry 
from  the  Lakes — Wordsworth  and  Southey  are  coming  up 
strong  from  the  north.  How  did  you  like  Hartley's  sonnets? 
The  first,  at  least,  is  vastly  fine.  1  am  ashamed  of  the  shabby 
letters  I  send,  but  I  am  by  nature  anything  but  neat.  Therein 
my  mother  bore  me  no  Quaker.  I  never  could  seal  a  letter 
without  dropping  the  wax  on  one  side,  besides  scalding  my 
fingers.  I  never  had  a  seal,  too,  of  my  own.  Writing  to  a 
great  man  lately,  who  is  moreover  very  heraldic,  I  borrowed 
a  seal  of  a  friend  who,  by  the  female  side,  claims  the  protec- 
toral  arms  of  Cromwell.  How  they  must  have  puzzled  my 
correspondent !  My  letters  are  generally  charged  as  double 
at  the  postoffice,  from  their  inveterate  clumsiness  of  foldure  ; 
so  you  must  not  take  it  disrespectful  to  yourself  if  I  send  you 
such  ungainly  scraps.  I  think  1  lose  100/.  a  year  at  the  In- 
dia House,  owing  solely  to  my  want  of  neatness  in  making 
up  accounts.  How  I  puzzle  'em  out  at  last  is  the  wonder.  1 
have  to  do  with  millions  ! 

*'  It  is  time  to  have  done  my  incoherences. 

"  Believe  me  yours  truly, 

"  C.  Lamb.'* 

Lamb  thus  records  a  meeting  with  the  poets. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

'•  April,  18^3 

"  Dear  Sir — I  wished  for  you  yesterday.  I  dined  in  Par- 
nassus, with  Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Rogers,  and  Tom  Moore 
— half  the  poetry  of  England  constellated  and  clustered  in 
Gloucester  Place  !  It  was  a  delightful  evenin*^  !  Coloridgo 
was  in  his  finest  vein  of  talk — had  all  the  talk  ;  and  let  'em 
talk  as  they  will  of  the  envy  of  poets,  I  am  sure  not  one  there 
but  was  content  to  be  nothing  but  a  listener.  The  Muses 
18* 


210  LETTER    TO    PROCTER. 

were  dumb  while  Apollo  lectured  on  his  and  their  fine  art. 
It  is  a  lie  that  poets  are  envious  ;  I  have  known  the  best  of 
them,  and  can  speak  to  it,  that  they  give  each  other  their 
merits,  and  are  the  kindest  critics  as  well  as  the  best  authors. 
I  am  scribbling  a  muddy  epistle  with  an  aching  head,  for  we 
did  not  quaff  Hippocrene  last  night ;  marry,  it  was  hippo- 
crass  rather.     Pray  accept  this  as  a  letter  in  the  mean  time." 


Here  is  an  apology  for  a  letter,  referring  to  the  vignette  on 
the  titlepage  of  one  of  his  friend's  books. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"May,  1823. 
"  Dear  Sir — I  am  vexed  to  be  two  letters  in  your  debt,  but 
I  have  been  quite  out  of  the  vein  lately.  A  philosophical 
treatise  is  wanting  of  the  causes  of  the  backwardness  with 
which  persons,  after  a  certain  time  of  life,  set  about  writing  a 
letter.  I  always  feel  as  if  I  had  nothing  to  say,  and  the  per- 
formance generally  justifies  the  presentiment. 

****** 

"  I  do  not  exactly  see  why  the  goose  and  little  goslings 
should  emblematize  a  Quaker  poet  that  has  no  children  or  but 
one.  But,  after  all,  perhaps  it  is  a  pelican.  The  '  Mens, 
Mene,  Tckel  Upharsi?i*  around  it  I  cannot  decipher.  The 
songster  of  the  night  pouring  out  her  effusions  amid  an  au- 
dience of  madge  owlets  would  be  at  least  intelligible.  A  full 
pause  here  comes  upon  me  as  if  I  had  not  a  word  more  left. 
I  will  shake  my  brain.  Once !  Twice  ! — nothing  comes 
up.  George  Fox  recommends  waiting  on  these  occasions.  I 
wait.  Nothing  comes.  G.  Fox — that  sets  me  off  again.  I 
have  finished  the  '  Journal,'  and  400  more  pages  of  the  *  Doc- 
trinals^^  which  I  picked  up  for  76".  Qd.  If  I  get  on  at  this 
rate,  the  society  will  be  in  danger  of  havmg  two  Quaker  poets 
to  patronise." 


The  following  letter  was  addressed  to  Mr.  Procter,  in  ac- 
knowledgment of  a  miniature  of  Pope  which  he  had  presented 
to  Lamb. 

TO    MR.    PROCTER. 

*'  Dear  Lad — You  must  think  me  a  brute  beast,  a  rhinoce- 
ros, never  to  have  acknowledged  the  receipt  of  your  precious 
present.  But,  indeed,  I  am  none  of  those  shocking  things, 
but  have  arrived  at  that  indisposition  to  letter-writing  which 
would  make  it  a  hard  exertion  to  write  three  lines  to  a  king 


LAMBS   CONTROVERSY   WITH   SOUTHEY.  211 

to  spare  a  friend's  life.  Whether  it  is  that  the  Magazine 
paying  me  so  much  a  page,  I  am  loath  to  throw  away  compo- 
sition— how  much  a  sheet  do  you  give  your  correspondents  ? 
I  have  hung  up  Pope,  and  a  gem  it  is,  in  my  towfi  room  ;  I 
hope  for  your  approval.  Though  it  accompanies  the  '  Essay 
on  Man,'  1  think  that  was  not  the  poem  he  is  here  medita- 
ting. He  would  have  looked  up,  somehow  affectedly,  as  if 
he  were  just  conceiving  'Awake,  my  St.  John.'  Neither  is 
he  in  the  '  Rape  of  the  Lock'  mood  exactly.  I  think  he  has 
just  made  out  the  last  lines  of  the  '  Epistle  to  Jervis,'  between 
gay  and  tender, 

'  And  other  beauties  envy  Wortley's  eyes.* 

*'  I'll  be  hanged  if  that  isn't  the  line.  *He  is  brooding  over 
it  with  a  dreamy  phantom  of  Lady  Mary.iloating  before  him. 
He  is  thinking  which  is  the  earliest  possible  day  and  hour 
that  she  will  tirst  see  it.  What  a  miniature  piece  of  gentililjf" 
it  is  !  Why  did  you  give  it  me?  1  do  not  like  you  enough 
to  give  you  anything  so  good. 

"  I  have  dined  with  T.  Moore  and  breakfasted  with  Rogers^ 
since  I  saw  you ;  have  much  to  say  about  them  when  we 
meet,  which,  I  trust,  will  be  in  a  week  or  two.  I  have  been 
overwatched  and  overpoeted  since  Wordsworth  has  been  i* 
town.  ■ '  f  was  obliged,  for  health  sake,  to  wish  him  gone  ;  but, 
now  he  is  gone,  I  feel  a  great  loss.  I  am  going  to  Dalston  to 
recruit,  and  have  serious  thoughts  of — altering  my  condition, 
that  is,  of  taking  to  sobriety.      What  do  you  advise  me  ? 

"  Rogers    spake  very  kincHy  ^   you,  as    everybody   does, 
and  none  with  so  much  reason  as  your 

"  C.  L." 


^ 


CHAPTER  XHL 

[1823.] 
Lamb's  Controversy  with  Southey. 

In  the  year  1823  Lamb  appeared,  for  the  first  and  only 
lime  of  his  life,  before  the  public  as  an  assailant ;  and  the  ob- 
ject of  his  attack  was  one  of  his  oldest  and  fastest  friends, 
Mr.  Southey.  It  might,  indeed,  have  been  predicted  of  Lamb, 
that  if  ever  he  did  enter  the  arena  of  personal  controversy,  it 
would  be  with  one  who  had  obtained  a  place  in  his  affection ; 


212  lamb's  controversy  with  southey. 

for  no  motive  less.^^werful  than  the  resentment  of  friendship 
which  deemed  itself  wounded  could  place  him  in  a  situation 
so  abhorr^t  to  his  habitual  thoughts.  Lamb  had,  up  to  this 
'time,  littleureason  to  love  reviews  or  reviewers  ;  and  the  con- 
nexion of  Southey  with  "  The  Quarterly  Review,"  while  he 
felt  that  it  raised,  and  softened,  and  refined  the  tone  of  that 
powerful  organ  of  a  great  party,  sometimes  vexed  him  for  his 
friend.  His  indignation  also  had  been  enlisted  on  behalf  of 
Hazlitt  and  Hunt,  who  had  been  attacked  in  this  work  in  a 
manner  which  he  regarded  as  unfair ;  for  the  critics  had  not 
been  content  with  descanting  on  the  peculiarities  in  the  style 
and  taste  of  the  one,  or  reprobating  the  political  or  personal 
vehemence  of  the  other — which  were  fair  subjects  of  contro- 
versy— but  spoke  of  them  wiih  a  contempt  which  every  man  of 
letters  had  a  right  ^o  resent  as  unjust.  He  had  been  much 
^Hnoyed  by  an  allusion  to  himself  in  an  article  on  "  Hazlitt's 
Political  Essays,"  which  appeared  in  the  Review  for  Novem- 
ber, 1819,  as  "one  whom  we  should  wish  to  see  in  more  re- 
spectable company ;"  for  he  felt  a  compliment  paid  him  at 
the  expense  of  a  friend  as  a  grievance  far  beyond  any  direct 

j^^l^r.tapW  on  himself  He  was  also  exceedingly  hurt  by  a  refer- 
ee made  in  an  article  on  Dr.  Reid's  work  "  On  Nervous  Af- 
fections," which  appeared  in,»J^ly,.1822,  to  an  ess^»4vjiich 

*  he  had  contributed  some  years  befojje  to  a  collection  of  tracts 
published  by  his  friend,  Mr.  Bazil  Montague,  on  the  effect  of 
spirituous  liquors,  entitled  "  The  Confessions  of  a  Drunkard." 
The  contributfen  of  this  paper  is|a  striki»g!-.proof  of^the  prev- 
^  alence  of  Lamb's  personal  reg&tds  over  all  selfish  feelings  and 
tastes ;  for  no  one  was  less  disposed  than  he  to  Montague's 
theory  or  practice  of  abstinence  ;  yet  he  was  -MiilMiig  to  grati- 
fy his  friend  by  this  ternSle  picture  of  the  extreme  effects  of 
intemperance,  of  which  his  own  occasional  deviations  from 
thetright  line  of  sobriety  had  given  him  hints  and  glimpses. 
'"•'The  reviewer  of  Dr.  Reid,  adverting  to  this  essay,  speaks  of 
it  as  "  a  fearful  p^ture  of  the  consequences  of  intemperance, 
which  WE  happen  to  know  is  a  true  tale."  How  far  it  was 
from  actual  truth,  ^e  "  Essays  of  Elia,"  the  production  of  a 
^^^^J^^i:«d§y,  in  whi-ch  the  maturity  of  his  feeling,  humour,  and 
reason  is  exhibited,  may  sufficiently  show.  These  articles 
^        were  not  written  by  Mr.  Southey,  but  they  prepared  Lamb 

'  to  feel  acutely  any  attack  from  the  Review  ;  and  a  paragraph 
in  an  article  in  the  number  for  July,  1823,  entitled  "  Progress 
of  Infidelity,"  in  which  he  recognised  the  hand  of  his  old 
friend,  gave  poignancy  to  all  the  painful  associations  which 
had  arisen  from  the  same  work,  and  concentrated  them  in 
one  bitter  feeling.     After  recording  some  of  the  confessions 


lamb's  controversy  with  southey.  213 

of  unbelievers   of   the   wretchedness   which    their   infidelity 
brought  on  them,  Mr.  Southey  thus  proceeded  : — 

"  Unbelievers  liave  not  always  been  honest  enough  thus  to 
express  their  real  feelings  ;  but  this  we  know  concerning  them, 
that  when  they  have  renounced  their  birthright  of  hope,  they 
have  not  been  able  to  divest  themselves  of  fear.     From  the 
nature  of  the  human   mind,  this  might   be  presumed,  and,  in 
fact,  it  is  so.     They  may  deaden  the   heart  and   stupify  the 
conscience,  but  they  cannot  destroy  the   imaginative  faculty. 
There  is  a  remarkable  proof  of  this  in  '  Elia's  Essays,' a  book 
which  wants  only  a  sounder  religious  feeling  to  be  as  delight- 
ful as  it  is  original.     In   that  upon  '  Witches  and  the  other 
iVight   Fears,'   he   says,   '  It   is   not  book,  or  picture,  or   the 
stories  of  foolish  servants  which  create  these  terrors  in  chil- 
dren ;  they  can,  at  most,  but  give  them  a  direction.     Dear  lit- 
tle T.  H.,  who,  of  all  children,  has  been  brought  up  with  the 
most  scrupulous  exclusion  of  every  taint  of  superstition,  who 
was  never  allowed  to  hear  of  goblin  or  apparition,  or  scarcely 
to  be  told  of  bad  men,  or   to   hear  or  read  of  any  distressing 
story,  finds  all  this  world  of  fear  from  which  he  has  been  so 
rigidly  excluded  ab  extra,  in  his  own  "  thick-coming  fancies," 
and  from  his  little  midnight  pillow  this  nursechild  of  optimism 
will  start  at   shapes,  unborrowed  of  tradition,  in   sweats  to 
which  the  reveries  of  the  well-damned  murderer  are  tranquil- 
lity.'    This  poor  child,  instead  of  being  trained  up  in  the  way 
he  should  go,  had  been  bred  in  the  ways  of  modern  philoso- 
phy ;   he   had   systematically  been   prevented  from  knowing 
anything  of  that  Saviour  who  said,  '  Suffer  little  children  to 
come  unto  me,  and  forbid  them  not,  for  of  such  is  the  kingdom  of 
Heaven  ;'  care  had  been  taken  that  he  should  not  pray  to  God, 
nor  lie  down  at  night  in  reliance  upon  his  good  providence  ! 
Nor  let  it  be  supposed  that  terrors  of  imagination  belong  to 
childhood  alone.     The  reprobate  heart,  which  has  discarded 
all  love  of  God,  cannot  so  easily  rid  itself  of  the  fear  of  the 
devil ;  and  even  when  it  succeeds   in   that  also,  it  will   then 
create  a  hell  for  itself.      We  have  heard  of  unbelievers  who 
thought  It  probable  that  they  should  be  awake  in  their  graves  ! 
and  this  was   the  opinion  for  which   they  had  exchanged   a 
Christian's  hope  of  immortality  !" 

The  allusion  in  this  paragraph  was  really,  as  Lamb  was 
afterward  convinced,  intended  by  Mr.  Southey  to  assist  the 
sale  of  the  book.  In  haste,  having  expunged  a  word  which 
he  thought  improper,  he  wrote  "  sounder  religious  feeling," 
not  satisfied  with  the  epiihet,  but  meaning  to  correct  it  in  the 
proof,  which,  unfortunately,  was  never  scut  him.      Lamb  saw  it 


214  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

on  his  return  from  a  month's  pleasant  holydays  at  Hastings, 
and  expressed  his  first  impression  respecting  it  in  a  letter 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  Dear  Sir — I  have  just  returned  from  Hastings,  where  are 
exquisite  views  and   walks,  and  where  I  have  given  up  my 
soul  to  walking,  and  I  am  now  suffering  sedentary  contrasts. 
I  am  a  long  time  reconciling  to  town  after  one  of  these  ex- 
cursions.    Home  is  become  strange,  and  will  remain  so  yet 
a  while  ;  home  is  the  most  unforgiving  of  friends,  and  always 
resents  absence  ;  I  know  its  old  cordial  looks  will  return,  but 
they  are  slow  in  clearing  up.     That  is  one  of  the  features  of 
this  our  galley-slavery,  that  peregrination  ended  makes  things 
worse.     I  felt  out  of  water  (with  all  the   sea  about  me)  at 
Hastings  ;  and,  just  as  I  had  learned  to  domicilitate  there,  I 
must  come  back  to  find  a  home  which  is  no  home.     I  abused 
Hastings,  but  learned  its  value.     There  are  spots,  inland  bays, 
(fee,  which  realize  the  notions  of  Juan  Fernandez.     The  best 
thing  I  lit  upon  by  accident  was  a  small  country  church  (by 
whom  or  when  built  unknown),  standing  bare   and  single  in 
the  midst  of  a  grove,  with  no  house  or  appearance  of  habita- 
tion within  a  quarter  of  a  mile,  only  passages  diverging  from  it 
through  beautiful  woods  to  so  many  farmhouses.     There  it 
stands,  like  the  first  idea  of  a  church,  before  parishioners  were 
thought  of,  nothing  but   birds  for  its  congregation  ;  or  like  a 
hermit's  oratory  (the  hermit  dead),  or  a  mausoleum  ;  its  effects 
singularly  impressive,  like  a  church  found  in  a  desert  isle  to 
startle  Crusoe  with  a  home  image  :  you  must  make  out  a  vicar 
and  a  congregation  from  fancy,  for  surely  none   come   there  ; 
yet  it  wants  not  its  pulpit,  and  its  font,  and  all  the  seemly  ad- 
ditaments  of  our  worship. 

"  Southey  has  attacked  '  Elia'  on  the  score  of  infidelity,  in 
the  Quarterly  article,  '  Progress  of  Infidelity.'  He  might  have 
spared  an  old  friend  such  a  construction  of  a  few  careless 
flights,  that  meant  no  harm  to  religion  ;  but  I  love  and  respect 
Southey,  and  will  not  retort.  I  hate  his  review,  and  his  being 
a  reviewer.  The  hint  he  has  droppod  will  knock  the  sale  of 
the  book  on  the  head,  which  was  almost  at  a  stop  before. 
Let  it  stop — there  is  corn  in  Egypt  while  there  is  cash  at 
Leadenhall !  You  and  I  are  something  besides  being  writers, 
thank  God ! 

'*  Yours  truly, 

"C.  L." 

This  feeling  was  a  little  diverted  by  the  execution  of  a 
scheme,  rather  suddenly  adopted,  of  removing  to  a  neat  cot- 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  215 

lage  at  Islington,  where  Lamb  first  found  himself  installed  in  the 
dignity  of  a  householder,      lie  thus  describes  his  residence 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"2d  September,  1823. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — What  will  you  say  to  my  not  writing?  You 
cannot  say  I  do  not  write  now.  When  you  come  London- 
ward,  you  will  find  me  no  longer  in  Covent  Garden  ;  I  have  a 
cottage  in  Colebrook  Row,  Islington  ;  a  collage,  for  it  is  de- 
tached ;  a  white  house,  with  six  good  rooms  in  it ;  the  New 
River  (rather  elderly  by  this  time)  runs  (if  a  moderate  walk- 
ing pace  can  be  so  termed)  close  to  the  foot  of  the  house  ;  and 
behind  is  a  spacious  garden,  with  vines  (I  assure  you),  pears, 
strawberries,  parsnips,  leeks,  carrots,  cabbages,  to  delight  the 
heart  of  old  Alcinous.  You  enter  without  passage  into  a 
cheerful  dining-room,  all  studded  over  and  rough  with  old 
books  ;  and  above  is  a  lightsome  drawing-room,  three  windows, 
full  of  choice  prints.  I  feel  like  a  great  lord,  never  having  had 
a  house  before. 

"  The  '  London,'  I  fear,  falls  ofl^.  I  linger  among  its  creak- 
ing rafters  like  the  last  rat;  it  will  topple  down  if  they  don't 
get  some  buttresses.     They  have  pulled  down  three  ;  Hazliit. 

Procter,  and  their  best  stay,  kind,  light-hearted  W ,  their 

Janus.     The  best  is,  neither  of  our  fortunes  is  concerned  in  it. 

"  I  heard  of  you  from  Mr.  P this   morning,  and  that 

gave  a  fillip  to  my  laziness,  which  has  been  intolerable  ;  but 
1  am  so  taken  up  with  pruning  and  gardening,  quite  a  new 
sort  of  occupation  to  me.  1  have  gathered  my  jargonels,  but 
my  Windsor  pears  are  backward.  The  former  were  of  exqui- 
site raciness.  I  do  now  sit  under  my  own  vme,  and  contem- 
plate the  growth  of  vegetable  nature.  I  can  now  understand 
in  what  sense  they  speak  of  father  Adam.  I  recognise  the 
paternity  while  I  watch  my  tulips.  I  almost  feei  with  him  too  ; 
for  the  first  day  I  turned  a  drunken  gardener  (as  he  let  in  the 
serpent)  into  my  Eden,  and  he  laid  about  him.  lopping  off  some 
choice  boughs,  <fec.,  which  hung  over  from  a  neighbour's  gar- 
den, and,  in  his  blind  zeal,  laid  waste  a  shade  which  had  shel- 
tered their  window  from  the  gaze  of  passers  by.  The  old 
gentlewoman  (fury  made  her  not  handsome)  could  scarcely  he 
reconciled  by  all  my  fine  words.  There  was  no  buttering  her 
parsnips.  She  talked  of  tlie  law.  What  a  lapse  to  commit 
on  the  first  day  of  my  happy  *  garden  slate  !' 

"  I  hope  you  transmitted  the  Fox  Journal  to  its  owner,  with 
suitable  thanks.  Pray  accept  this  for  a  letter,  and  believe  me, 
with  sincere  regards, 

''  Yours, 

-C.  L" 


216  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

In  the  next  letter  to  Barton  Lamb  referred  to  an  intended 
letter  to  Southey  in  the  Magazine. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  September,  1823. 
''  Dear  Sir — I  have  again  been  reading  your  '  Stanzas  on 
Bloomfield,'  which  are  the  most  appropriate  that  can  be  ima- 
gined— sweet  with  Doric  delicacy.     I  like  that — 

*  Our  own  more  chaste  Theocritus' — 

just  hinting  at  the  fault  of  the  Grecian.  I  love  that  stanza 
ending  with, 

'  Words,  phrases,  fashions  pass  away  ; 
But  truth  and  nature  live  through  all.' 

But  I  shall  omit  in  my  own  copy  the  one  stanza  which  alludes 
to  Lord  B.,  I  suppose.  It  spoils  the  sweetness  and  continuity 
of  the  feeling.  Cannot  we  think  of  Burns,  or  Thomson, 
without  sullying  the  thought  with  a  reflection  out  of  place  upon 
Lord  Rochester?  These  verses  might  have  been  inscribed 
upon  a  tomb  ;  are,  in  fact,  an  epitaph  ;  satire  does  not  look 
pretty  upon  a  tombstone.  Besides,  there  is  a  quotation  in  it, 
always  bad  in  verse,  seldom  advisable  in  prose.  I  doubt  if 
their  having  been  in  a  paper  will  not  prevent  T.  and  H.  from 
insertion  ;  but  I  shall  have  a  thing  to  send  in  a  day  or  two,  and 
shall  try  them.  Omitting  that  stanza,  a  very  little  alteration 
is  wanting  in  the  beginning  of  the  next.  You  see  I  use  free- 
dom. How  happily  (I  flatter  not)  you  have  brought  in  his  sub- 
jects ;  and  (I  suppose)  his  favourite  measure,  though  I  am  not 
acquainted  with  any  of  his  writings  but  the  '  Farmer's  Boy.' 
He  dined  with  me  once,  and  his  manners  took  me  exceed- 
ingly. 

"  I  rejoice  that  you  forgive  my  long  silence.  I  continue  to 
estimate  my  own  roof  comforts  highly.  How  could  I  remain 
all  my  life  a  lodger  ?  My  garden  thrives  (I  am  told),  though 
I  have  yet  reaped  nothing  but  some  tiny  salads  and  withered 
carrots.  But  a  garden's  a  garden  anywhere,  and  twice  a  gar- 
den in  London. 

****** 

"  Do  you  go  on  with  your  '  Quaker  Sonnets  V  have  'em 
ready  with  '  Southey's  Book  of  the  Church.'  I  meditate  a 
letter  to  S.  in  the  '  London,'  which,  perhaps,  will  meet  the  fate 
of  the  sonnet. 

"  Excuse  my  brevity,  for  I  write  painfully  at  office,  liable 
to  a  hundred  callings  off';  and  I  can  never  sit  down  to  an 
epistle  elsewhere.      I  read  or  walk.     If  you  return  this  letter 


ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY.  217 

to  the  postoffice,  I  think  they  will  return  fourpence,  seeing  it 
is  but  half  a  one.     Believe  me,  though, 

"  Entirely  vours, 

"  C.  L." 

The  contemplated  expostulation  with  Southey  was  written, 
and  appeared  in  the  "London  Magazine  for  October,  1823." 
Lamb  did  not  print  it  in  any  subsequent  collection  of  his  es- 
says ;  but  I  give  it  now,  as  I  have  reason  to  know  that  its 
publication  will  cause  no  painful  feelings  in  the  mind  of  Mr. 
Southey,  and  as  it  forms  the  only  ripple  on  the  kindliness  of 
Lamb's  personal  and  literary  life. 

LETTER  OF  ELIA  TO  ROBERT  SOUTHEY,  ESQ. 

"  Sir — You  have  done  me  an  unfriendly  office,  without,  per- 
haps, much  considering  what  you  were  doing.  You  have 
given  an  ill  name  to  my  poor  lucubrations.  In  a  recent  paper 
on  Infidelity,  you  usher  in  a  conditional  commendation  of  them 
with  an  exception  ;  which,  preceding  the  encomium,  and 
taking  up  nearly  the  same  space  with  it,  must  impress  your 
readers  with  the  notion  that  the  objectionable  parts  in  them 
are  at  least  equal  in  quantity  to  the  pardonable.  The  censure 
is,  in  fact,  the  criticism  ;  the  praise — a  concession  merely. 
Exceptions  usually  follow,  to  qualify  praise  or  blame.  But 
there  stands  your  reproof,  in  the  very  front  of  your  notice,  in 
ugly  characters,  like  some  bugbear,  to  frighten  all  good  Chris- 
tians from  purchasing.  Through  you  I  am  become  an  object 
of  suspicion  to  preceptors  of  youth  and  fathers  of  families. 
^A  book  which  wants  only  a  sounder  religious  feeling  to  be  as 
delightful  as  it  is  originaW  With  no  further  explanation,  what 
must  your  readers  conjecture,  but  that  my  little  volume  is 
some  vehicle  for  heresy  or  infidelity  ?  The  quotation,  which 
you  honour  me  by  subjoining,  oddly  enough,  is  of  a  character 
which  bespeaks  a  temperament  in  the  writer  the  very  reverse 
of  that  your  reproof  goes  to  insinuate.  Had  you  been  taxing 
me  with  superstition,  the  passage  would  have  been  pertinent 
to  the  censure.  Was  it  worth  your  while  to  go  so  far  out  of 
your  way  to  affront  the  feelings  of  an  old  friend,  and  commit 
yourself  by  an  irrelevant  quotation,  for  the  pleasure  of  reflect- 
ing upon  a  poor  child,  an  exile  at  (icnoa  ? 

"  I  am  at  a  loss  what  particular  essay  you  had  in  view  (if 
my  poor  ramblings  amount  to  that  appellation)  when  you  were 
in  such  a  hurry  to  thrust  in  your  objection,  like  bad  news, 
foremost.  Perhaps  the  paper  on  '  Saying  Graces'  was  the 
obnoxious  feature.  I  have  endeavoured  there  to  rescue  a 
voluntary  duty — good  in  place,  but  never,  as  I  remember,  lit- 

VoL.  I.— 19  K 


218  ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY. 

erally  commanded — from  the  charge  of  an  undecent  formality. 
Rightly  taken,  sir,  that  paper  was  not  against  graces,  but 
want  of  grace  ;  not  against  the  ceremony,  but  the  careless- 
ness and  slovenliness  so  often  observed  in  the  performance 
of  it. 

"  Or  was  it  that  on  the  '  New  Year' — in  which  I  have  de- 
scribed the  feelings  of  the  merely  natural  man  on  a  consider- 
ation of  the  amazing  change  which  is  supposable  to  take 
place  on  our  removal  from  this  fleshly  scene  ?  If  men  would 
honestly  confess  their  misgivings  (which  few  men  will),  there 
are  times  when  the  strongest  Christian  of  us,  I  believe,  has 
reeled  under  questionings  of  such  staggering  obscurity.  I  do 
not  accuse  you  of  this  weakness.  There  are  some  who 
tremblingly  reach  out  shaking  hands  to  the  guidance  of  Faith 
— others  who  stoutly  venture  into  the  dark  (their  Human 
Confidence  their  leader,  whom  they  mistake  for  Faith)  ;  and, 
investing  themselves  beforehand  with  cherubic  wings,  as  they 
fancy,  find  their  new  robes  as  familiar,  and  fitting  to  their  sup- 
posed growth  and  stature  in  godliness,  as  the  coat  they  left 
off  yesterday — some  whose  hope  totters  upon  crutches — 
others  who  stalk  into  futurity  upon  stilts. 

"  The  contemplation  of  a  Spiritual  World — which,  without 
the  addition  of  a  misgiving  conscience,  is  enough  to  shake 
some  natures  to  their  foundation — is  smoothly  got  over  by 
others,  who  shall  float  over  the  black  billows,  in  their  little 
boat  of  No-distrust,  as  unconcernedly  as  over  a  summer  sea. 
The  difference  is  chiefly  constitutional. 

"  One  man  shall  love  his  friends  and  his  friends'  faces ; 
and,  under  the  uncertainty  of  conversing  with  them  again,  in 
the  same  manner  and  familiar  circumstances  of  sight,  speech, 
&c.,  as  upon  earth — in  a  moment  of  no  irreverent  weakness 
— for  a  dream- while — no  more — would  be  almost  content,  for 
a  reward  of  a  life  of  virtue  (if  he  could  ascribe  such  accept- 
ance to  his  lame  performances),  to  take  up  his  portion  with 
those  he  loved,  and  was  made  to  love,  in  this  good  world, 
which  he  knows — which  was  created  so  lovely,  beyond  his 
deservings.  Another,  embracing  a  more  exalted  vision — so 
that  he  might  receive  indefinite  additaments  of  power,  knowl- 
edge, beauty,  glory,  &c. — is  ready  to  forego  the  recognition 
of  humbler  individualities  of  earth,  and  the  old  familiar  faces. 
The  shapings  of  our  heavens  are  the  modifications  of  our  con- 
stitution ;  and  Mr.  Feeble  Mind  or  Mr.  Great  Heart  is  born 
in  every  one  of  us. 

"  Some  (and  such  have  been  accounted  the  safest  divines) 
have  shrunk  from  pronouncing  upon  the  final  state  of  any 
man  ;  nor  dare  they  pronounce  the  case  of  Judas  to  be  des- 


ELIA  TO    SOUTHEY.  219 

perate.  Others  (with  stronger  optics),  as  plainly  as  with  the 
eye  of  flesh,  shall  behold  a  given  king  in  bliss,  and  a  given 
chamberlain  in  torment ;  even  to  the  eternizing  of  a  cast  of 
the  eye  in  the  latter,  his  own  self-mocked  and  good-humour- 
edly-borne  deformity  on  earth,  but  supposed  to  aggravate  the 
uncouth  and  hideous  expression  of  his  pangs  in  the  other 
place.  That  one  man  can  presume  so  far,  and  that  another 
would,  with  shuddering,  disclaim  such  confidences,  is,  I  be- 
lieve, an  effect  of  the  nerves  purely. 

*'  If  in  either  of  these  papers  or  elsewhere  I  have  been 
betrayed  into  some  levities— not  affronting  the  sanctuary,  but 
glancing,  perhaps,  at  some  of  the  outskirts  and  extreme  edges, 
the  debateable  land  between  the  holy  and  the  profane  regions 
— (for  the  admixture  of  man's  inventions,  twisting  themselves 
with  the  name  of  the  religion  itself,  has  artfully  made  it  dif- 
ficult to  touch  even  the  alloy  without,  in  some  men's  estima- 
tion, soiling  the  fine  gold) — if  1  have  sported  with  the  purlieus 
of  serious  matter — it  was,  I  dare  say,  a  humour — be  not  star- 
tled, sir — which  I  have  unwittingly  derived  from  yourself. 
You  have  all  your  life  been  making  a  jest  of  the  devil.  Not 
of  the  scriptural  meaning  of  that  dark  essence — personal  or 
allegorical  ;  for  the  nature  is  nowhere  plainly  delivered.  I 
acquit  you  of  intentional  irreverence.  But,  indeed,  you  have 
made  wonderfully  free  with,  and  been  mighty  pleasant  upon, 
the  popular  idea  and  attributes  of  him.  A  noble  lord,  your 
brother  visionary,  has  scarcely  taken  greater  liberties  with  the 
material  keys,  and  merely  Catholic  notion  of  St.  Peter.  You 
have  flattered  him  in  prose  ;  you  have  chanted  him  in  goodly 
odes.  You  have  been  his  jester  ;  volunteer  laureate,  and 
self-elected  court  poet  to  Beelzebub. 

"  You  have  never  ridiculed,  I  believe,  what  you  thought 
to  be  religion,  but  you  are  always  girding  at  what  some  pious, 
but  perhaps  mistaken,  folks  think  to  be  so.  For  this  reason 
I  am  sorry  to  hear  that  you  are  engaged  upon  a  life  of  George 
Fox.  I  know  you  will  fail  into  the  error  of  intermixing  some 
comic  stuff  with  your  seriousness.  The  Quakers  tremble  at 
the  subject  in  your  hands.  'I'he  Methodists  are  shy  of  you 
upon  account  of  fheir  founder.  But,  above  all,  our  popish 
brethren  are  most  in  your  debt.  'J'he  errors  of  that  church 
have  proved  a  fruitful  source  to  your  scofling  vein.  Their 
legend  has  been  a  golden  one  to  you.  And  here  your  friends, 
sir,  have  noticed  a  notable  inconsistency.  To  the  imposing 
rites,  tlie  solemn  penances,  devout  austerities  of  that  commu- 
nion ;  the  afleciing  lliougli  erring  piety  of  their  Jirnnits;  tlie 
silence  and  solitude  of  the  Charireux — tlieir  crossinus,  their 
holy  waters — their  Virgin,  and  their  saints — to  tlusc.  they 

K2 


220  ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY. 

say,  you  have  been  indebted  for  the  best  feelings  and  the 
richest  imagery  of  your  Epic  poetry.  You  have  drawn  co- 
pious draughts  upon  Loretto.  We  thought  at  one  time  you 
were  going  post  to  Rome  ;  but  that,  in  the  facetious  commen- 
taries which  it  is  your  custom  to  append  so  plentifully,  and 
(some  say)  injudiciously,  to  your  loftiest  performances  in  this 
kind,  you  spurn  the  uplifted  toe,  which  you  but  just  now 
seemed  to  court;  leave  his  holiness  in  the  lurch  ;  and  show 
him  a  fair  pair  of  Protestant  heels  under  your  Romish  vest- 
ment. When  we  think  you  already  at  the  wicket,  suddenly  a 
violent  cross  wind  blows  you  transverse — 

'  Ten  thousand  leagues  awry.        *        * 
*        *        *        *        Then  might  we  see 
Cowls,  hoods,  and  habits,  with  their  wearers,  toss' 
And  fluttered  into  rags  ;  then  relics,  beads, 
Indulgences,  dispenses,  pardons,  bulls, 
The  sport  of  winds.' 

You  pick  up  pence  by  showing  the  hallowed  bones,  shrine, 
and  crucifix ;  and  you  take  money  a  second  time  by  exposing 
the  trick  of  them  afterward.  You  carry  your  verse  to  Cas- 
tle Angelo  for  sale  in  a  morning ;  and,  swifter  than  a  pedlar 
can  transmute  his  pack,  you  are  at  Canterbury  with  your  prose 
ware  before  night. 

'*  Sir,  is  it  that  I  dislike  you  in  this  merry  vein  ?  The  re- 
verse. No  countenance  becomes  an  intelligent  jest  better 
than  your  own.  It  is  your  grave  aspect,  when  you  look  awful 
upon  your  poor  friends,  which  I  would  deprecate. 

"  In  more  than  one  place,  if  I  mistake  not,  you  have  been 
pleased  to  compliment  me  at  the  expense  of  my  companions. 
I  cannot  accept  your  compliment  at  such  a  price.  The  up- 
braiding a  man's  poverty  naturally  makes  him  look  about  him, 
to  see  whether  he  be  so  poor  indeed  as  he  is  presumed  to 
be.  You  have  put  me  upon  counting  my  riches.  Really,  sir, 
I  did  not  know  I  was  so  wealthy  in  the  article  of  friendships. 

There  is  ,   and  ,   whom   you  never  heard  of,   but 

exemplary  characters  both,  and  excellent  churchgoers  ;  and 
N.,mine  and  my  father's  friend  for  nearly  half  a  century  ;  and 
the  enthusiast  for  Wordsworth's  poetry, ,  a  little  taint- 
ed with  Socinianism,  it  is   to  be  feared,  but  constant  in  his 

attachments,  and    a   capital  critic  ;    and  ,  a    sturdy  old 

Athanasian,  so  that  sets  all  to  rights  again  ;  and  W.,  the 
light,  and  warm-as-light  hearted,  Janus  of  the  London  ;  and 
the  translator  of  Dante,  still  a  curate,  modest  and  amiable 
C;  and  Allan  C,  the  large-headed  Scot;  and  P — r,  can- 
did and  affectionate  as  his  own  poetry  ;  and  A — p,  Cole- 
ridge's friend ;  and  G — n,  his  more  than  friend  ;  and  Cole- 
ridge himself,  the  same  to  me  still  as  in  those  old  evenings 


ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY.  221 

when  we  used  to  sit  and  speculate  (do  you  remember  them, 
sir?)    at  our  old    Salutation    tavern,   upon  Pantisocracy  and 

golden   days    to  come   on   earth ;  and  W th   (why,  sir,  I 

might  drop  my  rent-roll  here  ;  such  goodly  farms  and  manors 
have  I  reckoned  up  already.  In  what  possessions  has  not 
this  last  name  alone  estated  me  ! — but  I  will  go  on) — and  M., 

the  noble-minded  kinsman,  by  wedlock,  of  W th  ;  and  H. 

C.  R.,  unwearied  in  the  offices  of  a  friend  ;  and  Clarkson,  al- 
most above  the  narrowness  of  that  relation,  yet  condescend- 
ing not  seldom  heretofore  from  the  labour  of  his  world-em- 
bracing charity  to  bless  my  humble  roof;  and  the  galless  and 
single-minded  Dyer  ;  and  the  high-minded  associate  of  Cook, 
the  veteran  colonel,  with  his  lusty  heart  still  sending  cartels 
of  defiance  to  old  Time  ;  and,  not  least,  W.  A.,  the  last  and 
steadiest  left  to  me  of  that  little  knot  of  whist-players  that  used 
to  assemble  weekly,  for  so  many  years,  at  the  Queen's  Gate 
(you  remember  them,  sir?),  and  called  Admiral  Burney  friend. 

"  I  will  come  to  the  point  at  once.  I  believe  you  will  not 
make  many  exceptions  to  my  associates  so  far.  But  I  have 
purposely  omitted  some  intimacies,  which  I  do  not  yet  repent 
of  having  contracted,  with  two  gentlemen,  diametrically  op- 
posed to  you  in  principles.  You  will  understand  me  to  allude 
to  the  authors  of  *  Rimmi'  and  of  the  '  Table  Talk.'  And  first, 
of  the  former. 

"  It  is  an  error  more  particularly  incident  to  persons  of  the 
correctest  principles  and  habits,  to  seclude  themselves  from 
the  rest  of  mankind  as  from  another  species,  and  form  into 
knots  and  clubs.  The  best  people,  herding  thus  exclusively, 
are  in  danger  of  contracting  a  narrowness.  Heat  and  cold, 
dryness  and  moisture,  in  the  natural  world,  do  not  fly  asunder, 
to  split  the  globe  into  sectarian  parts  and  separations  ;  but 
mingling,  as  they  best  may,  correct  the  malignity  of  any  sin- 
gle predominance.  The  analogy  holds,  I  suppose,  in  the 
moral  world.  If  all  the  good  people  were  to  ship  themselves 
off'  to  Terra  Incognita,  what,  in  humanity's  name,  is  to  become 
of  the  refuse  ?  If  the  persons  whom  I  have  chiefly  in  view 
have  not  pushed  matters  to  this  extremity  yet,  they  carry 
them  as  far  as  they  can  go.  Instead  of  mixing  with  the  in- 
fidel and  the  freethinker — in  the  room  of  opening  a  negotia- 
tion, to  try  at  least  to  find  out  at  which  gate  the  error  entered 
— they  huddle  close  together,  in  a  weak  fear  of  infection,  like 
that  pusillanimous  underling  in  Spenser — 

'  This  is  the  wandering  wood,  this  Error's  den  ; 
A  monster  vile,  whom  God  and  man  dors  hate : 
Therefore,  I  reed,  beware.     Fly,  t\y,  quoth  then 
The  fearful  Dwarf.' 

19* 


222  ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY. 

And,  if  they  be  writers  in  orthodox  journals — addressing  them- 
selves only  to  the  irritable  passions  of  the  unbeliever — they 
proceed  in  a  safe  system  of  strengthening  the  strong  hands 
and  confirming  the  valiant  knees  ;  of  converting  the  already 
converted,  and  proselyting  their  own  party.  I  am  the  more 
convinced  of  this  from  a  passage  in  the  very  treatise  which 
occasioned  this  letter.  It  is  where,  having  recommended  to 
the  doubter  the  writings  of  Michaelis  and  Lardner,  you  ride 
triumphant  over  the  necks  of  all  infidels,  skeptics,  and  dissent- 
ers, from  this  time  to  the  world's  end,  upon  the  wheels  of  two 
unanswerable  deductions.  1  do  not  hold  it  meet  to  set  down, 
in  a  miscellaneous  compilation  like  this,  such  religious  words 
as  you  have  thought  fit  to  introduce  into  the  pages  of  a  petu- 
lant literary  journal.  1  therefore  beg  leave  to  substitute  nu- 
merals, and  refer  to  the  '  Quarterly  Review'  (for  July)  for  fill- 
ing of  them  up.  '  Here,'  say  you,  '  as  in  the  history  of  7,  if 
these  books  are  authentic,  the  events  which  they  relate  must 
be  true;  if  they  were  written  by  8,  9  is  10  and  11.'  Your 
first  deduction,  if  it  means  honestly,  rests  upon  two  identical 
propositions  ;  though  I  suspect  an  unfairness  in  one  of  the 
terms,  which  this  would  not  be  quite  the  proper  place  for  ex- 
plicating. At  all  events,  you  have  no  cause  to  triumph  ;  you 
have  not  been  proving  the  premises,  but  refer  for  satisfaction 
therein  to  very  long  and  laborious  works,  which  may  well 
employ  the  skeptic  a  twelvemonth  or  two  to  digest  before  he 
can  possibly  be  ripe  for  your  conclusion.  When  he  has  sat- 
isfied himself  about  the  premises,  he  will  concede  to  you  the 
inference,  I  dare  say,  most  readily.  But  your  latter  deduction, 
viz.,  that  because  8  has  written  a  book  concerning  9,  there- 
fore 10  and  11  was  certainly  his  meaning,  is  one  of  the  most 
extraordinary  conclusions  per  saltum  that  1  have  had  the  good 
fortune  to  meet  with.  As  far  as  10  is  verbally  asserted  in 
the  writings,  all  sects  must  agree  with  you ;  but  you  cannot 
be  ignorant  of  the  many  various  ways  in  which  the  doctrine 
of  the  *******  has  been  understood,  from  a  low  figurative  ex- 
pression (with  the  Unitarians)  up  to  the  most  mysterious  ac- 
tuality ;  in  which  highest  sense  alone  you  and  your  church 
take  it.  And  for  11,  and  that  there  is  no  other  possible  con- 
clusion— to  hazard  this  in  the  face  of  so  many  thousands  of 
Arians  and  Socinians,  &c.,  who  have  drawn  so  opposite  a 
one,  is  such  a  piece  of  theological  hardihood  as,  I  think, 
warrants  me  in  concluding  that,  when  you  sit  down  to  pen 
theology,  you  do  not  at  all  consider  your  opponents  ;  but  have 
in  your  eye,  merely  and  exclusively,  readers  of  the  same  way 
of  thinking  with  yourself,  and  therefore  have  no  occasion  to 
trouble  yourself  with  the  quality  of  the  logic  to  which  you 
treat  them. 


ELIA    TO    SOUTH  EV.  223 

"Neither  can  I  think,  if  you  had  had  the  welfare  of  the 
poor  child — over  whose  hopeless  condition  you  whine  so  lam- 
entably and  (I  must  think)  unseasonably — seriously  at  heart, 
that  you  could  have  taken  the  step  of  sticking  him  up  hy  name 
— T.  H.  is  as  good  as  naming  him — to  perpetuate  an  outrage 
upon  the  parental  feelings,  as  long  as  the  '  Quarterly  Review' 
shall  last.  Was  it  necessary  to  specify  an  individual  case, 
and  give  to  Christian  compassion  the  appearance  of  personal 
attack  ?  Is  this  the  way  to  conciliate  unbelievers,  or  not,  ra- 
ther, to  widen  the  breach  irreparably  ? 

*'  I  own  I  could  never  think  so  considerably  of  myself  as 
to  decline  the  society  of  an  agreeble  or  worthy  man  upon  dif- 
ference of  opinion  only.  The  impediments  and  the  facilita- 
tions to  a  sound  belief  are  various  and  inscrutable  as  the  heart 
of  man.  Some  believe  upon  weak  principles.  Others  can- 
not feel  ihe  efficacy  of  the  strongest.  One  of  the  most  can 
did,  most  upright,  and  single-meaning  men  I  ever  knew,  was 
the  late  Thomas  Holcroft.  I  believe  he  never  said  one  thing 
and  meant  another  in  his  life  ;  and,  as  near  as  1  can  guess, 
he  never  acted  otherwise  than  with  the  most  scrupulous  at- 
tention to  conscience.  Ought  we  to  wish  ihe  character  false 
for  the  sake  of  a  hollow  compliment  to  Christianity? 

"  Accident  introduced  me  to  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  L.  H., 
and  the  experience  of  his  many  friendly  qualities  confirmed  a 
friendship  between  us.  You,  who  have  been  misrepresented 
yourself,  I  should  hope  have  not  lent  an  idle  ear  to  the  cal- 
umnies which  have  been  spread  abroad  respecting  this  gen- 
tleman. I  was  admitted  to  his  household  for  some  years,  and 
do  most  solemnly  aver  that  I  believe  him  to  be  in  his  domes- 
tic relations  as  correct  as  any  man.  He  chose  an  ill-judged 
subject  for  a  poem  ;  the  peccant  humours  of  which  have  been 
visited  on  him  tenfold  by  the  artful  use  which  his  adversaries 
have  made  of  an  equivocal  term.  The  subject  itself  was 
started  by  Dante,  but  belter  because  brieflier  treated  of.  But 
the  crime  of  the  lovers,  in  the  Italian  and  the  English  poet, 
with  its  aggravated  enormity  of  circumstance,  is  not  of  a  kind 
(as  the  critics  of  the  latter  well  knew)  with  those  conjunc- 
tions, for  which  Nature  herself  has  provided  no  excuse,  be- 
cause no  temptation.  It  has  nothing  in  common  with  the 
black  horrors  sung  by  Ford  and  Massinger.  The  familiari- 
zing of  it  in  tale  or  fable  may  be  for  that  reason  incidentally 
more  contagious.  In  spite  of  Rimini,  I  must  look  upon  its 
author  as  a  man  of  taste  and  a  poet.  He  is  better  than  so ; 
he  is  one  of  the  most  cordial-minded  men  I  ever  knew,  and 
matchless  as  a  fireside  companion.  1  mean  not  to  alTront  or 
wound   your  feelings  when   I  say  that,  in  his  more   genial 


224  ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY. 

moods,  he  has  often  reminded  me  of  you.  There  is  the  same 
air  of  mild  dogmatism — the  same  condescending  to  a  boyish 
sportiveness — in  both  your  conversations.  His  handwriting 
is  so  much  the  same  with  your  own,  that  I  have  opened  more 
than  one  letter  of  his,  hoping,  nay,  not  doubting,  but  it  was 
from  you,  and  have  been  disappointed  (he  will  bear  with  my 
saying  so)  at  the  discovery  of  my  error.  L.  H.  is  unfortunate 
in  holding  some  loose  and  not  very  definite  speculations  (for, 
at  times,  I  think  he  hardly  knows  whither  his  premises  would 
carry  him)  on  marriage — the  tenets,  I  conceive,  of  the  '  Polit- 
ical Justice'  carried  a  little  further.  For  anything  I  could 
discover  in  his  practice,  they  have  reference,  like  those,  to 
some  future  possible  condition  of  society,  and  not  to  the  pres- 
ent times.  But  neither  for  these  obliquities  of  thinking  (upon 
which  my  own  conclusions  are  as  distant  as  the  poles  asun- 
der), nor  for  his  political  asperities  and  petulances,  which 
are  wearing  out  with  the  heats  and  vanities  of  youth — did  I 
select  him  for  a  friend ;  but  for  qualities  which  fitted  him  for 
that  relation.  I  do  not  know  whether  I  flatter  myself  with 
being  the  occasion,  but  certain  it  is,  that,  touched  with  some 
misgivings  for  sundry  harsh  things  which  he  had  written 
aforetime  against  our  friend  C,  before  he  left  this  country  he 
sought  a  reconciliation  with  that  gentleman  (himself  being  his 
own  introducer),  and  found  it. 

'*  L.  H.  is  now  in  Italy ;  on  his  departure  to  which  land 
with  much  regret  I  took  my  leave  of  him  and  of  his  little 
family — seven  of  them,  sir,  with  their  mother — and  as  kind  a 
set  of  little  people  (T.  H.  and  all),  as  affectionate  children  as 
ever  blessed  a  parent.  Had  you  seen  them,  sir,  I  think  you 
could  not  have  looked  upon  them  as  so  many  little  Jonases — 
but  rather  as  pledges  of  the  vessel's  safely,  that  was  to  bear 
such  a  freight  of  love. 

"  I  wish  you  would  read  Mr.  H.'s  lines  to  that  same  T.  H.- 
*  six  years  old,  during  a  sickness  :' — 

*  Sleep  breaks  at  last  from  out  thee. 
My  little  patient  boy' — 

(they  are  to  be  found  in  the  47th  page  of  '  Foliage') — and  ask 
yourself  how  far  they  are  out  of  the  spirit  of  Christianity.  I 
have  a  letter  from  Italy,  received  but  the  other  day,  into  which 
L.  H.  has  put  as  much  as  heart,  and  as  many  friendly  yearn- 
ings after  old  associates  and  native  country  as,  I  think,  papei 
can  well  hold.  It  would  do  you  no  hurt  to  give  that  the  pe 
rusal  also. 

"  From  the  other  gentleman  1  neither  expect  nor  desire  (as 
he  is  well  assured)  any  such  concessions  as  L.  H.  made  to  C 


ELI  A    TO    SOUTHEV.  225 

What  hath  soured  him,  and  made  him  to  suspect  his  friends  of 
infidelity  towards  him,  when  tliere  was  no  such  matter,  1  know 
not.  I  stood  well  with  him  for  fifteen  years  (the  proudest  of 
my  life),  and  have  ever  spoken  my  full  mind  of  him  to  some, 
to  whom  his  panegyric  must  naturally  be  least  tasteful.  I 
never  in  thought  swerved  from  him,  1  never  betrayed  him,  I 
never  slackened  in  my  admiration  of  him  ;  I  was  the  same  to 
him  (neither  belter  nor  worse),  though  he  could  not  see  it, 
as  in  the  days  when  he  thought  fit  to  trust  me.  At  ihis  in- 
stant he  may  be  preparing  for  me  some  compliment  above 
my  deserts,  as  he  sprinkled  many  such  among  his  admirable 
books,  for  which  1  rest  his  debtor  ;  or,  for  anything  I  know  or 
can  guess  to  the  contrary,  he  may  be  about  to  read  a  lecture 
on  my  weaknesses.  He  is  welcome  to  them  (as  he  was  to  my 
humble  hearth],  if  they  can  divert  a  spleen  or  ventilate  a  fit 
of  sullenness.  1  wish  he  would  not  quarrel  with  the  world  at 
the  rate  he  does  ;  but  the  reconciliation  must  be  effected  by 
himself,  and  1  despair  of  living  to  see  that  day.  But,  pro- 
testing against  much  that  he  has  written,  and  some  things 
which  he  chooses  to  do ;  judging  him  by  his  conversation 
which  I  enjoyed  so  long  and  relished  so  deeply  ;  or  by  his 
books,  in  those  places  where  no  clouding  passion  intervenes 
—  1  should  belie  my  own  conscience  if  1  said  less  than  that  I 
think  W.  H.  to  be,  in  his  natural  and  healthy  state,  one  of  the 
wisest  and  finest  spirits  breathing.  So  far  from  being  ashamed 
of  that  intimacy  which  was  betwixt  us,  it  is  my  boast  that  I 
was  able  for  so  many  years  to  have  preserved  it  entire  ;  and 
I  thmk  1  shall  go  to  my  grave  without  finding,  or  expecting  to 
find,  such  another  companion.  But  I  forget  my  manners — 
you  will  pardon  me,  sir — I  return  to  the  correspondence. 

"  Sir,  you  were  pleased  (you  know  where)  to  invite  me  to 
a  compliance  with  the  wholesome  forms  and  doctrines  of  the 
Church  of  England.  I  take  your  advice  with  as  much  kindness 
as  it  was  meant.  But  I  must  think  the  invitation  rather  more 
kind  than  seasonable.  I  am  a  Dissenter.  The  last  sect  with 
which  you  can  remember  me  to  have  made  common  profes- 
sion were  the  Unitarians.  You  would  not  think  it  very  per- 
tinent if  (fearing  that  was  not  all  well  with  you)  I  were  gravely 
to  invite  you  (for  a  remedy)  to  attend  with  me  a  course  of  Mr. 
Belsham's  Lectures  at  Hackney,  i^erhaps  1  have  scruples  to 
some  of  your  forms  and  doctrines.  But,  if  I  come,  am  1  se- 
cure of  civil  treatment?  The  last  time  I  was  in  any  of  your 
places  of  worsliip  was  on  Easter  Sunday  last.  I  had  the  satis- 
faction of  listening  to  a  very  sensible  sermon  of  an  argument- 
ative turn,  delivered  with  great  propriety  by  one  of  your  bish- 
ops.    The  place  was  Westminster  Abbey.     As  such  religion 

K  3 


226  ELIA    TO    SOUTHEY. 

as  I  have  has  always  acted  on  me  more  by  way  of  sentiment 
than  argumentative  process,  I  was  not  unwilling,  after  sermon 
ended,  by  no  unbecoming  transition,  to  pass  over  to  some  se- 
rious feelings,  impossible  to  be  disconnected  from  the  sight  of 
those  old  tombs,  &c.  But,  by  whose  order  1  know  not,  I  was 
debarred  that  privilege  even  for  so  short  a  space  as  a  few 
minutes  ;  and  turned,  like  a  dog  or  some  profane  person,  out 
into  the  common  street ;  with  feelings  which  I  could  not  help, 
but  not  very  congenial  to  the  day  or  the  discourse.  I  do  not 
know  that  1  shall  ever  venture  myself  again  into  one  of  your 
churches. 

"  You  had  your  education  at  Westminster  ;  and,  doubtless, 
among  those  dim  aisles  and  cloisters  you  must  have  gathered 
much  of  that  devotional  feeling  in  those  young  years  on  which 
your  purest  mind  feeds  still — and  may  it  feed  !  The  anti- 
quarian spirit,  strong  in  you,  and  gracefully  blending  ever  with 
the  religious,  may  have  been  sown  in  you  among  those  wrecks 
of  splendid  mortality.  You  owe  it  to  the  place  of  your  edu- 
cation ;  you  owe  it  to  your  learned  fondness  for  the  architec- 
ture of  your  ancestors ;  you  owe  it  to  the  venerableness  of 
your  ecclesiastical  establishment,  which  is  daily  lessened  and 
called  in  question  through  these  practices,  to  speak  aloud 
your  sense  of  them  ;  never  to  desist  raising  your  voice  against 
them  till  they  be  totally  done  away  with  and  abolished  ;  till 
the  doors  of  Westminster  Abbey  be  no  longer  against  the 
decent,  though  low-in-purse  enthusiast  or  blameless  devotee, 
who  must  commit  an  injury  against  his  family  economy,  if  he 
would  be  indulged  with  a  bare  admission  within  its  walls. 
You  owe  it  to  the  decencies  which  you  wish  to  see  main- 
tained in  its  impressive  services,  that  our  cathedral  be  no 
longer  an  object  of  inspection  to  the  poor  at  those  times  only, 
in  which  they  must  rob  from  their  attendance  on  the  worship 
every  minute  which  they  can  bestow  upon  the  fabric.  In  vain 
the  public  prints  have  taken  up  this  subject,  in  vain  such  poor 
nameless  writers  as  myself  express  their  indignation.  A  word 
from  you,  sir — a  hint  in  your  journal — would  be  sufficient  to 
fling  open  the  doors  of  the  beautiful  temple  again,  as  we  can 
remember  them  when  we  were  boys.  At  that  time  of  life, 
what  would  the  imaginative  faculty  (such  as  it  is)  in  both  of 
us  have  suffered  if  the  entrance  to  so  much  reflection  had 
been  obstructed  by  the  demand  of  so  much  silver  !  If  we  had 
scraped  it  up  to  gain  an  occasional  admission  (as  we  certainly 
should  have  done),  would  the  sight  of  those  old  tombs  have 
been  as  impressive  to  us  (while  we  had  been  weighing  anx- 
iously prudence  against  sentiment)  as  when  the  gates  stood 
open,  as  those  of  the  adjacent  park ;  when  we  could  walk  in 


iiLIA    TO    bOUTHKV.  227 

at  any  time,  as  the  mood  brought  us,  for  a  shorter  or  longer 
time,  as  that  lasted  ?     Is   the  being  shown  over  a  place  the 
same  as  silently  for  ourselves  detecting  the  genius  of  it?     In 
no  part  of  our  beloved  Abbey  now  can  a  person  find  entrance 
(out  of  service  time)  under  the  sum  of  two  shillings.     The 
rich  and  the  great  will  smile  at  the  anti-climax  presumed  to 
lie   in  these  two  short  words.     But  you   can  tell  them,  sir, 
how  much  quiet  worth,  how  much  capacity  for  enlarged  feel- 
ing, how  much  taste   and  genius,  may  coexist,  especially  in 
youth,  with  a  purse  incompetent  to  this  demand.     A  respect- 
ed friend  of  ours,  during  his  late  visit  to  the  metropolis,  pre- 
sented  himself  for  admission  to  Saint  Paul's.     At  the  same 
time  a  decently-clothed  man,  with  as  decent  a  wife  and  childj 
were  bargaining  for  the  same  indulgence.     The  price  was  only 
twopence  each  person.     The  poor  but  decent  man  hesitated, 
desirous  to  go  in  :   but  there  were  three  of  them,  and  he  turned 
away  reluctantly.     Perhaps  he  wished  to  have  seen  the  tomb 
of  Nelson.     Perhaps  the  interior  of  the  cathedral  was  his  ob- 
ject.    But  in  the  state  of  his  finances,  even  sixpence  might 
reasonably  seem  too  much.     Tell  the  aristocracy  of  the  coun- 
try (no  man  can  do  it  more  impressively)  ;  instruct  them  of 
what  value  these  insignificant  pieces  of  money,  these  minims 
to  their  sight,  may  be  to  their  humbler  brethren.     Shame  these 
sellers   out  of  the   Temple  !     Show  the  poor   that  you  can 
sometimes  think  of  them  in  some  other  light  than  as  mutineers 
and  malecontenis.     Conciliate  them  by  such  kind  methods  to 
their  superiors,  civil  and  ecclesiastical.     Stop  the  mouths  of 
the  raiiers  ;  and  suffer  your  old  friends,  upon  the  old  terms, 
again  to  honour  and  admire  you.     Stifle  not  the  suggestions  of 
your  better  nature  with  the  stale  evasion  that  an  indiscriminate 
admission  would  expose  the  tombs  to  violation.     Remember 
your  boy-days.     Did  you  ever  see  or  hear  of  a  mob  in   the 
Abbey  while  it  was  free  to  all?     Do  the  rabble  come  there,  or 
trouble  their  heads  about  such  speculations?     It  is  all  that  you 
can  do  to  drive  them  into  your  churches  ;   they  do  not  volun- 
tarily ofler  themselves.     They  have,  alas  !  no  passion  for  an- 
tiquities ;  for  tomb  of  king  or  prelate,  sage  or  poet.     If  they 
had,  they  would  no  longer  be  the  rabble. 

"  For  forty  years  that  I  have  known  the  fabric,  the  only 
well-attested  charge  of  violation  adduced  has  been — a  ridic- 
ulous dismemberment  committed  upon  the  efiigy  of  that  amia- 
ble spy,  Major  Andre.  And  is  it  for  this — the  wanton  mischief 
of  some  schoolboy,  fired,  perhaps,  with  raw  notions  of  trans- 
atlantic freedom — or  the  remote  possibiliiy  of  such  a  mischief 
occurring  again,  so  easily  to  be  prevented  by  stationing  a 
constable  within  the  walls,  if  the  vergers  are  incompetent  to 


228  LETTER    TO    SOUTHEY. 

the  duty — is  it  upon  such  wretched  pretences  that  the  people 
of  England  are  made  to  pay  a  new  Peter's  pence,  so  long  ab- 
rogated ;  or  must  content  themselves  with  contemplating  the 
ragged  exterior  of  their  cathedral  1  The  mischief  was  done 
about  the  time  that  you  were  a  scholar  there.  Do  you  know 
anything  about  the  unfortunate  relic  ?  can  you  help  us  in  this 
emergency  to  find  the  nose  ?  or  can  you  give  Chantrey  a  no- 
tion (from  memory)  of  its  pristine  life  and  vigour  ?  I  am 
willing,  for  peace'  sake,  to  subscribe  a  guinea  towards  a  res- 
toration of  the  lamented  feature. 

"  I  am,  sir, 

"  Your  humble  servant, 

«'  EUA." 

The  feeling  with  which  this  letter  was  received  by  Southey 
maybe  best  described  in  his  own  words  in  a  letter  to  the  pub- 
lisher. "  On  my  part  there  was  not  even  a  momentary  feeling 
of  anger  ;  I  was  very  much  surprised  and  grieved,  because  I 
knew  how  much  he  would  condemn  himself.  And  yet  no 
resentful  letter  was  ever  written  less  offensively  :  his  gentle 
nature  may  be  seen  in  it  throughout."  Southey  was  right  in 
his  belief  in  the  revulsion  Lamb's  feelings  would  undergo 
when  the  excitement  under  which  he  had  written  subsided ; 
for,  although  he  would  retract  nothmg  he  had  ever  said  or 
written  in  defence  of  his  friends,  he  was  ready  at  once  to  sur- 
render every  resentment  of  his  own.  Southey  came  to  Lon- 
don in  the  following  month,  and  wrote  proposing  to  call  at 
Islington  ;  and  21st  November  Lamb  thus  replied  : — 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  E.  I.  H.,  2ist  November,  1823. 
*'  Dear  Southey — The  kindness  of  your  note  has  melted 
away  the  mist  which  was  upon  me.  I  have  been  fighting 
against  a  shadow.  That  accursed  Q.  R.  had  vexed  me  by 
a  gratuitous  speaking,  of  its  own  knowledge,  that  the  '  Con- 
fessions of  a  D d'  was  a  genuine  description  of  the  state 

of  the  writer.  Little  things,  that  are  not  ill  meant,  may  pro- 
duce much  ill.  That  might  have  injured  me  alive  and  dead. 
I  am  in  a  public  ofhce,  and  my  life  is  ensured.  I  was  pre- 
pared for  anger,  and  I  thought  I  saw,  in  a  few  obnoxious 
words,  a  hard  case  of  repetition  directed  against  me.  I  wish 
both  magazine  and  review  at  the  bottom  of  the  sea.  I  shall 
be  ashamed  to  see  you,  and  my  sister  (though  innocent)  will 
be  still  more  so ;  for  the  folly  was  done  v-ithout  her  knowl- 
edge, and  has  made  her  uneasy  ever  since.  My  guardian 
angel  was  absent  at  that  time. 


LETTER  TO  BERNARD  BARTON.  229 

**  I  will  muster  up  courage  to  see  you,  however,  any  day 
next  week  (Wednesday  excepted).  We  shall  hope  that  you 
will  bring  Edith  with  you.  That  will  be  a  second  mortification. 
She  will  hate  to  see  us,  but  come  and  heap  embers.  We 
deserve  it,  1  for  what  I've  done,  and  she  for  being  my  sister. 

"  Do  come  early  in  the  day,  by  sunlight,  that  you  may  see 
my  Milton. 

"  I  am  at  Colebrook  cottage,  Colebrook  Row,  Islington.  A 
detached  whitish  house,  close  to  the  New  River,  end  of  Cole- 
brook Terrace,  left  hand  coming  from  Sadler's  Wells. 

*'  Will  you  let  me  know  the  day  before  ? 

"  Your  penitent, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"  P.S.  I  do  not  think  your  handwriting  at  all  like  ****'8. 
I  do  not  think  many  things  I  did  think." 

In  the  following  letter  of  the  same  date  Lamb  anticipates 
the  meeting. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — I  am  ashamed  at  not  acknowledging  your 
kind  little  poem,  which  I  must  needs  like  much  ;  but  I  pro- 
test I  thought  I  had  done  it  at  the  moment.  Is  it  possible  a  let- 
ter has  miscarried  1  Did  you  get  one  in  which  I  sent  you  an 
extract  from  the  poems  of  Lord  Sterling?  I  should  wonder 
if  you  did,  for  I  sent  you  none  such.  There  was  an  incipient 
lie  strangled  in  the  birth.  Some  people's  conscience  is  so 
tender  !  But,  in  plain  truth,  I  thank  you  very  much  for  the 
verses.  I  have  a  very  kind  letter  from  the  laureate,  with  a 
self-invitation  to  come  and  shake  hands  with  me.  This  is 
truly  handsome  and  noble.  'Tis  worthy  of  my  old  ideas  of 
Southey.  Shall  not  I,  think  you,  be  covered  with  a  red  suf- 
fusion ? 

"  You  are  too  much  apprehensive  of  your  complaint :  I 
know  many  that  are  always  ailing  of  it,  and  live  on  to  a  good 
old  age.  I  know  a  merry  fellow  (you  partly  know  him)  who, 
when  his  medical  adviser  told  him  he  had  drunk  away  all 
that  part,  congratulated  himself  (now  his  liver  was  gone)  that 
he  should  be  the  longest  liver  of  the  two. 

"  The  best  way  in  these  cases  is  to  keep  yourself  as  igno- 
rant as  you  can,  as  ignorant  as  the  world  was  before  Galen, 
of  the  entire  inner  constructions  of  the  animal  man  ;  not  to  be 
conscious  of  a  midriff;  to  hold  kidneys  (save  those  of  sheep 
and  swine)  to  be  an  agreeable  fiction;  not  to  know  where- 
about the  gall  grows  ;  to  account  the  circulation  of  the  blood 
a  mere  idle  whim  of  Harvey's  ;  to  acknowledge  no  niechaniem 
20 


230  EMMA    ISOLA. 

not  visible  ;  for,  once  fix  the  seat  of  your  disorder,  and  yonr 
fancies  flux  into  it  like  so  many  bad  humours.  Those  med- 
ical gentry  choose  each  his  favourite  part ;  one  takes  the 
lungs,  another  the  aforesaid  liver,  and  refers  to  that  whatever 
in  the  animal  economy  is  amiss.  Above  all,  use  exercise, 
take  a  little  more  spirituous  liquors,  learn  to  smoke,  continue 
to  keep  a  good  conscience,  and  avoid  tamperings  with  hard 
terms  of  art — viscosity,  scirrhosity,  and  those  bugbears  by 
which  simple  patients  are  scared  into  their  graves.  Believe 
the  general  sense  of  the  mercantile  world,  which  holds  that 
desks  are  not  deadly.  It  is  the  mind,  good  B.  B.,  and  not  the 
limbs,  that  taints  by  long  sitting.  Think  of  the  patience  of 
tailors,  think  how  long  the  lord  chancellor  sits,  think  of  the 
brooding  hen  !  I  protest  1  cannot  answer  thy  sister's  kind 
inquiry ;  but  I  judge  I  shall  put  forth  no  second  volume. 
More  praise  than  buy ;  and  T.  and  H.  are  not  particularly 
disposed  for  martyrs.  Thou  wilt  see  a  funny  passage,  and 
yet  a  true  history,  of  George  Dyer's  aquatic  incursion  in  the 
next  *  London.'  Beware  his  fate  when  thou  comest  to  see 
me  at  my  Colebrook  cottage.  I  have  filled  my  little  space 
with  my  little  thoughts.  I  wish  thee  ease  on  thy  sofa,  but 
not  too  much  indulgence  on  it.  From  my  poor  desk,  thy  fel- 
low-sufferer, this  bright  November, 

''  C.  L." 

Southey  went  to  Colebrook  cottage  as  proposed  ;  the  awk- 
wardness of  meeting  went  off  in  a  moment ;  and  the  affection- 
ate intimacy,  which  had  lasted  for  almost  twenty  years,  was 
renewed,  to  be  interrupted  only  by  death. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

[1823  to  1825.] 
Letters  to  Ainsworth,  Barton,  and  Coleridge. 

Lamb  was  fond  of  visiting  the  universities  in  the  summer 
vacation,  and  repeatedly  spent  his  holyday  month  at  Cam- 
bridge with  his  sister.  On  one  of  these  occasions  they  met 
with  a  little  girl  who,  being,  in  a  manner,  alone  in  the  world, 
engaged  their  sympathies,  and  soon  riveted  their  affections. 
Emma  Isola  was  the  daughter  of  Mr.  Charles  Isola,  who  had 
been  one  of  the  esquire  bedells  of  the  university ;  her  grand- 


LETTERS    TO    AINSWORTH.  231 

father,  Agostino  Isola,  had  been  compelled  to  fly  from  Milan 
because  a  friend  took  up  an  English  book,  in  his  apartment 
which  he  had  carelessly  left  in  view.  This  good  old  man 
numbered  among  his  pupils  Gray  the  poet,  Mr.  Pitt,  and,  in 
his  old  age,  Wordsworth,  whom  he  instructed  in  the  Italian 
language.  His  little  granddaughter,  at  the  time  when  she  had 
the  good  fortune  to  win  the  regard  of  Mr.  Lamb,  had  lost  both 
her  parents,  and  was  spending  her  holydays  with  an  aunt, 
who  lived  with  a  sister  of  Mr.  Ayrton,  at  whose  house  Lamb 
generally  played  his  evening  rubber  during  his  stay  at  Cam- 
bridge. The  liking  which  both  Lamb  and  his  sister  took  for 
the  little  orphan  led  to  their  begging  her  of  her  aunt  for  the 
next  holydays  ;  their  regard  for  her  increased  ;  she  regularly 
spent  the  holydays  with  them  till  she  left  school,  and  after- 
ward was  adopted  as  a  daughter,  and  lived  generally  with 
them  until  1833,  when  she  married  Mr.  Moxon.  Lamb  was 
fond  of  taking  long  walks  in  the  country,  and  as  Miss  Lamb's 
strength  was  not  always  equal  to  these  pedestrian  excursions, 
she  became  his  constant  companion  in  walks  which  even  ex- 
tended "to  the  green  fields  of  pleasant  Hertfordshire." 

About  this  time  Lamb  added  to  his  list  of  friends  Mr.  Hood, 
the  delightful  humorist ;  Hone,  lifted  for  a  short  time  into 
political  fame  by  the  prosecution  of  his  Parodies,  and  the  sig- 
nal energy  and  succeiss  of  his  defence,  but  now  striving  by 
unwearied  researches,  which  were  guided  by  a  pure  taste  and 
an  honest  heart,  to  support  a  numerous  family  ;  and  Ainsworth, 
then  a  youth,  who  has  since  acquired  so  splendid  a  reputation 
as  the  author  of  "  Rookwood"  and  "  Crichton."  Mr.  Ains- 
worth, then  resident  at  Manchester,  excited  by  an  enthusiastic 
admiration  of  Elia,  had  sent  him  some  books,  for  which  he 
thus  conveyed  his  thanks  to  his  unseen  friend. 

TO    MR.    AINSWORTH. 

"  India  House,  Dec.  9,  1823. 
"Dear  Sir — I  should  have  thanked  you  for  your  books  and 
compliments  sooner,  but  have  been  waiting  for  a  revise  to  be 
sent,  which  does  not  come,  though  I  returned  the  proof  on  the 
receipt  of  your  letter.  I  have  read  Warner  with  grt'at  pleas- 
ure. What  an  elaborate  piece  of  alliteration  and  antithesis  ! 
why,  it  must  have  been  a  labour  far  above  the  most  diflicult 
versification.  There  is  a  fine  simile  or  picture  of  Semiramis 
arming  to  repel  a  siege.  I  do  not  mean  to  keep  tho  book,  for 
I  suspect  you  are  forming  a  curious  collection,  and  I  do  not 
pretend  to  anything  of  the  kind.  I  have  not  a  black-letter 
book  among  mine,  old  Chaucer  excepted,  and  am  not  biblio- 
manist  enough  to  like   black   letter.     It  is   painful  to  read ; 


1232  LETTERS    TO    AINSWORTH. 

therefore  I  must  insist  on  returning  it  at  opportunity,  not  from 
contumacy  and  reluctance  to  be  obliged,  but  because  it  must 
suit  you  better  than  me.  The  loss  of  a  present  from  should 
never  exceed  the  gain  of  a  present  to.  I  hold  this  maxim  in- 
fallible in  the  accepting  line.  I  read  your  magazines  with 
satisfaction.  I  thoroughly  agree  with  you  as  to  '  The  Ger- 
man Faust,'  as  far  as  1  can  do  justice  to  it  from  an  English 
translation.  'Tis  a  disagreeable  canting  tale  of  seduction, 
which  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  spirit  of  Faustus — curiosity. 
Was  the  dark  secret  to  be  explored  to  end  in  the  seducing  a 
weak  girl,  which  might  have  been  accomplished  by  earthly 
agency  ?  When  Marlow  gives  his  Faustus  a  mistress,  he  flies 
him  at  Helen,  flower  of  Greece,  to  be  sure,  and  not  at  Miss 
Betsy  or  Miss  Sally  Thoughtless. 

'  Cut  is  the  branch  that  bore  the  goodly  fruit, 
And  wither'd  is  Apollo's  laurel  tree  : 
Faustus  is  dead.' 

"  What  a  noble  natural  transition  from  metaphor  to  plain 
speaking  !  as  if  the  figurative  had  flagged  in  description  of 
such  a  loss,  and  was  reduced  to  tell  the  fact  simply. 

"  I  must  now  thank  you  for  your  very  kind  invitation.  It 
is  not  out  of  prospect  that  I  may  see  Manchester  some  day, 
and  then  1  will  avail  myself  of  your  kindness.  But  holydays 
are  scarce  things  with  me,  and  the  laws  of  attendance  are 
getting  stronger  and  stronger  at  Leadenhall.  But  I  shall  bear 
it  in  mind.  Meantime,  something  may  (more  probably)  bring 
you  to  town,  where  I  shall  be  happy  to  see  you.  I  am 
always  to  be  found  (alas !)  at  my  desk  in  the  forepart  of  the 
day. 

"  I  wonder  why  they  do  not  send  the  revise.  I  leave  late 
at  office,  and  my  abode  lies  out  of  the  way,  or  I  should  have 
seen  about  it.  If  you  are  impatient,  perhaps  a  line  to  the 
printer,  directing  him  to  send  it  me,  at  Accountant's  Office, 
may  answer.  You  will  see  by  the  scrawl  that  I  only  snatch 
a  few  minutes  from  intermitting  business. 

*'  Your  obliged  servant, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"  (If  I  had  time  I  would  go  over  this  letter  again,  and  dot 
all  my  i's.)" 

To  Ainsworth,  still  pressing  him  to  visit  Manchester,  he 
sent  the  following  reply. 

TO    MR.    AINSWORTH. 

"  My  dear  Sir — You  talk  of  months  at  a  time,  and  I  know 
not  what  inducements  to  visit  Manchester,  Heaven  knows 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  233 

how  gratifying !  but  I  have  had  my  little  month  of  1823  al- 
ready. It  is  all  over;  and,  without  incurring  a  disagreeable 
favour,  I  cannot  so  much  as  get  a  single  holyday  till  the  sea- 
son returns  with  the  next  year.  Even  our  half-hour's  ab- 
sences from  office  are  set  down  in  a  book  !  Next  year,  if  I 
can  spare  a  day  or  two  of  it,  I  will  come  to  Manchester,  but  I 
have  reasons  at  home  against  longer  absences. 

"  I  am  so  ill  just  at  present  (an  illness  of  my  own  procu- 
ring last  night  ;  who  is  perfect  ?)  that  nothing  but  your  very 
great  kindness  could  make  me  write.  I  will  bear  in  mind  the 
letter  to  W.  W.,  and  you  shall  have  it  quite  in  time,  before 
the  12th. 

"  My  aching  and  confused  head  warns  me  to  leave  off. 
"With  a  muddled  sense  of  gratefulness,  which  I  shall  appre- 
hend more  clearly  to-morrow, 

"  I  remain,  your  friend  unseen, 

"  C.  L. 

"  I.  H.,  29th. 

"  Will  your  occasions  or  inclination  bring  you  to  London  ? 
It  will  give  me  great  pleasure  to  show  you  everything  that 
Islington  can  boast,  if  you  know  the  meaning  of  that  Cockney 
sound.  We  have  the  New  River!  I  am  ashamed  of  this 
scrawl,  but  I  beg  you  to  accept  it  for  the  present.  I  am  full 
of  qualms. 

'  A  fool  at  fifty  is  a  fool  indeed.' " 

Bernard  Barton  still  frequently  wrote  to  him  ;  and  he  did 
not  withhold  the  wished-for  reply  even  when  letter-writing 
was  a  burden.  The  following  gives  a  ludicrous  account  of 
his  indisposition  : — 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — Do  you  know  what  it  is  to  succumb  under 
an  insurmountable  day-mare — '  a  whoreson  lethargy,'  Fal- 
staff  calls  it,  an  indisposition  to  do  anything,  or  to  be  anything 
— a  total  deadness  and  distaste — a  suspension  of  vitality — an 
indifference  to  locality — a  numb,  soporifical,  good-for-nothing- 
ness — an  ossification  all  over — an  oysterlike  insensibility  to 
the  passing  events — a  mind-stupor — a  brawny  defiance  to  the 
needles  of  a  thrusting-in  conscience  ?  Did  you  ever  have  a 
very  bad  cold,  with  a  total  irresolution  to  submit  to  water-gru- 
el processes  ?  This  has  been  for  many  weeks  my  lot  and 
my  excuse  ;  my  fingers  drag  heavily  over  this  paper,  and,  to 
my  thinking,  it's  three-and-lwenty  furlongs  from  hence  to  the 
end  of  this  demi-sheet.  I  have  not  a  thing  to  say  ;  nothing  is 
of  more  importance  than  another ;  I  am  flatter  than  a  denial  or  a 
20* 


234  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

pancake ;  emptier  than  Judge 's  wig  when  the  head  is  in  it ; 

duller  than  a  country  stage  when  the  actors  are  off  it;  a  cipher, 
an  0  !  I  acknowledge  life  at  all  only  by  an  occasional  con- 
vulsional  cough,  and  a  permanent  phlegmatic  pain  in  the  chest. 
I  am  weary  of  the  world,  and  the  world  is  weary  of  me.  My 
day  is  gone  into  twilight,  and  I  don't  think  it  worth  the  ex- 
pense of  candles.  My  wick  hath  a  thief  it,  but  I  can't  muster 
courage  to  snuff  it,  I  inhale  suffocation ;  I  can't  distinguish 
veal  from  mutton  ;  nothing  interests  me.  'Tis  twelve  o'clock, 
and  Thurtell  is  just  now  coming  out  upon  the  New  Drop, 
Jack  Ketch  alertly  tucking  up  his  greasy  sleeves  to  do  the 
last  office  of  mortality,  yet  cannot  I  elicit  a  groan  or  a  moral 
reflection.  If  you  told  me  the  world  would  be  at  an  end  to-mor- 
row, I  should  just  say,  '  will  it  V  I  have  not  volition  enough 
left  to  dot  my  z's,  much  less  to  comb  my  eyebrows  ;  my  eyes 
are  set  in  my  head ;  my  brains  are  gone  out  to  see  a  poor  re- 
lation in  Moorfields,  and  they  did  not  say  when  they'd  come 
back  again ;  my  scull  is  a  Grub-street  attic  to  let — not  so 
much  as  a  joint-stool  left  in  it ;  my  hand  writes,  not  I,  just  as 
chickens  run  about  a  little  when  their  heads  are  off.  Oh  for 
a  vigorous  fit  of  gout,  of  cholic,  toothache — an  earwig  in  my 
auditory,  a  fly  in  my  visual  organs  ;  pain  is  life — the  sharper, 
the  more  evidence  of  life  ;  but  this  apathy,  this  death  !  Did 
you  ever  have  an  obstinate  cold — a  six  or  seven  weeks'  un- 
intermitting  chill  and  suspension  of  hope,  fear,  conscience, 
and  everything  ?  Yet  do  I  try  all  I  can  to  cure  it ;  I  try  wine, 
and  spirits,  and  smoking,  and  snuff"  in  unsparing  quantities, 
but  they  all  only  seem  to  make  me  worse  instead  of  better.  I 
sleep  in  a  damp  room,  but  it  does  me  no  good  ;  I  come  home 
late  o'nights,  but  do  not  find  any  visible  amendment ! 

"It  is  just  fifteen  minutes  after  twelve  ;  Thurtell  is  by  this 
time  a  good  way  on  his  journey,  baiting  at  Scorpion,  perhaps  ; 
Ketch  is  bargaining  for  his  cast  coat  and  waistcoat ;  the  Jew 
demurs  at  first  at  three  half-crowns;  but,  on  consideration  that 
he  may  get  somewhat  by  showing  'em  in  the  town,  finally 
closes. 

"  C.  L." 

Barton  took  this  letter  rather  too  seriously,  and  Lamb  thus 
sought  to  remove  his  friendly  anxieties. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  My  dear  Sir — That  peevish  letter  of  mine,  which  was 
meant  to  convey  an  apology  for  my  incapacity  to  write,  seems 
to  have  been  taken  by  you  in  too  serious  a  light ;  it  was  only 
my  way  of  telling  you  I  had  a  severe  cold      The  fact  is,  I 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  235 

have  been  insuperably  dull  and  lethargic  for  many  weeks,  and 
cannot  rise  to  the  vigour  ot  a  letter,  much  less  an  essay. 
'J'he  '  London'  must  do  without  me  for  a  lime,  for  I  have  lost 
all  interest  about  it;  and,  whether  I  shall  recover  it  or  not,  I 
know  not.  I  will  bridle  my  pen  another  time,  and  not  teaze 
ai  d  puzzle  you  with  my  oddities.  I  shall  begin  to  feel  a  little 
more  alive  with  the  spring.  Winter  is  to  me  (mild  or  harsh) 
always  a  great  trial  of  the  spirits.  I  am  ashamed  not  to 
have  noticed  your  tribute  to  Woolman,  whom  we  both  love  so 
much.  It  is  done  in  your  good  manner.  Your  friend  Taylor 
called  on  me  some  time  since,  and  seems  a  very  amiable  man. 
His  last  story  is  painfully  fine.  His  book  I  '  like  ;'  it  is  only 
too  stufl'ed  with  scripture,  too  parsonish.  'I'he  best  thing  in  it 
is  the  boy's  own  story.  When  I  say  it  is  too  full  of  scripture, 
I  mean  it  is  too  full  of  direct  quotations  :  no  book  can  have 
too  much  of  silent  scripture  in  it ;  but  the  natural  power  of  a 
story  is  diminished  when  the  uppermost  purpose  of  the  writer 
seems  to  be  to  recommend  something  else.  You  know  what 
Horace  says  of  the  Deus  intersit?  1  am  not  able  to  explain 
myself — you  must  do  it  for  me.  My  sister's  part  in  the  '  Lei- 
cester School'  (about  two  thirds)  was  purely  her  own  ;  as  it 
was  (to  the  same  quantity)  in  the  '  Shakspeare  Tales'  which 
bears  my  name.  I  wrote  only  the  '  Witch  Aunt;'  the  '  First 
going  to  Church;'  and  the  final  story  about  'A  little  Indian 
girl'  in  a  ship.  Your  account  of  my  blackballing  amused 
me.  /  think,  as  Quakers,  they  did  right.  There  are  many 
things  in  my  little  book  hard  to  be  understood.  The  more  I 
think,  the  more  I  am  vexed  at  having  puzzled  you  with  that 
letter ;  but  I  have  been  so  out  of  letter-writing  lately  that  it 
is  a  sore  effort  to  sit  down  to  it;  and  I  felt  in  your  debt,  and 
sat  down  waywardly  to  pay  you  in  bad  money.  Never  mind 
my  dulness  ;  I  am  used  to  long  intervals  of  it.  The  heavens 
seem  brass  to  me  ;  then  again  comes  the  refreshing  shower — 

'  I  have  been  merry  once  or  twice  ere  now.' 

"  You    said   somethincr   about   Mr.  M in  a  late  latter, 

which  1  believe  I  did  not  advert  to.  1  shall  be  happy  to  show 
hitn  mv  Milton  (it  is  all  the  show  things  I  have)  at  any  lime 
he  will  take  the  trouble  of  a  jaunt  to  Islington.  I  do  also  hope 
to  see  Mr.  Taylor  there  some  day.  Pray  say  so  to  both. 
Coleridge's  book  is  in  good  part  printed,  but  sticks  a  little  for 
more  ropy.  It  bears  an  unsaleable  title,  '  Extracts  from  Bishop 
Leighton,'  but  I  am  confident  there  will  be  plenty  of  good 
notes  in  it.  *  *  *  *  *  *  * 

"Keep  your  good  spirits  up,  dear  B.  B.,  mine  will  return  : 
they  are  at  present  in  abeyance  ;  but  1  am  rather  lethargic 


236  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

than  miserable.  I  don't  know  but  a  good  horsewhip  would  be 
more  beneficial  to  me  than  physic.  My  head  without  aching 
will  teach  yours  to  ache.  It  is  well  I  am  getting  to  the  con- 
clusion. I  will  send  a  better  letter  when  I  am  a  better  man. 
Let  me  thank  you  for  your  kind  concern  for  me  (which,  I  trust, 
will  have  reason  soon  to  be  dissipated,)  and  assure  you  that  it 
gives  me  pleasure  to  hear  from  you. 

"  Yours  truly, 

"  C.  L." 

The  following  sufficiently  indicate  the  circumstances  under 
which  they  were  written  : — 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  Febuary,  1824. 
"  My  dear  Sir — Your  title  of  '  Poetic  Vigils'  arrides  me 
much  more  than  a  volume  of  verse  which  has  no  meaning. 
The  motto  says  nothing,  but  I  cannot  suggest  a  better.  I  do 
not  like  mottoes  but  when  they  are  singularly  felicitous  ;  there 
is  a  foppery  in  them  ;  they  are  unplain,  unquakerish  ;  they 
are  good  only  where  they  flow  from  the  title,  and  are  a  kind  of 
justification  of  it.  There  is  nothing  about  watchings  or  lucu- 
brations in  the  one  you  suggest,  no  commentary  on  vigils. 
By-the-way,  a  wag  would  recommend  you  to  the  line  of 
Pope, 

*  Sleepless  himself-— to  give  his  readers  sleep' — 

I  by  no  means  wish  it ;  but  it  may  explain  what  I  mean,  that 
a  neat  motto  is  child  of  the  title.  I  think  '  Poetic  Vigils'  as 
short  and  sweet  as  can  be  desired  ;  only  have  an  eye  on  the 
proof,  that  the  printer  do  not  substitute  Virgils,  which  would 
ill  accord  with  your  modesty  of  meaning.  Your  suggested 
motto  is  antique  enough  in  spelling  and  modern  enough  in 
phrases — a  good  modern  antique  ;  but  the  matter  of  it  is  ger- 
main  to  the  purpose,  only  supposing  the  title  proposed  a  vin- 
dication of  yourself  from  the  presumption  of  authorship.  The 
first  title  was  liable  to  this  objection — that  if  you  were  dis- 
posed to  change  it,  and  the  bookseller  insisted  on  its  appear- 
ance in  two  tomes,  how  oddly  it  would  sound,  '  A  Volume  of 
Verse  in  two  Volumes,  Second  Edition,'  &c.  You  see  this 
my  wicked  intention  of  curtailing  this  epistolet  by  the  above 
device  of  large  margin.  But,  in  truth,  the  idea  of  letterizing 
has  been  oppressive  to  me  of  late,  above  what  your  candour 
gives  me  credit  for.  There  is  Southey,  whom  I  ought  to 
have  thanked  a  fortnight  ago  for  a  present  of  the  *  Church 
Book :'  I  have  never  had  courage  to  buckle  myself  in  earnest 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  237 

even  to  acknowledge  it ;  and  yet  I  am  accounted  by  some 
people  a  good  man  !  How  cheap  that  character  is  acquired  ! 
Pay  your  debts,  don't  borrow  money,  nor  twist  your  kitten's 
neck  off,  nor  disturb  a  congregation,  &;c.,  your  business  is 
done.  I  know  things  (for  thoughts  are  things)  of  myself 
which  would  make  every  friend  I  have  fly  me  as  a  plague 
patient.  I  once  set  a  dog  upon  a  crab's  leg  that  was  shoved 
out  under  a  mass  of  seaweeds — a  pretty  little  feeler!  Oh! 
pah  !  how  sick  I  am  of  that !  And  a  lie,  a  mean  one,  I  once 
told.  I  stink  in  the  midst  of  respect.  I  am  much  hypt.  The 
fact  is,  my  head  is  heavy,  but  there  is  hope  ;  or,  if  not,  I  am 
better  than  a  poor  shellfish  ;  not  morally,  when  1  set  the  whelp 
upon  it,  but  have  more  blood  and  spirits.  Things  may  turn 
up,  and  I  may  creep  again  into  a  decent  opinion  of  myself. 
Vanity  will  return  with  sunshine.  Till  when,  pardon  my 
neglects,  and  impute  it  to  the  wintry  solstice. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"Dear  B,  B. — I  am  sure  I  cannot  fill  a  letter,  though  I 
should  disfurnish  my  scull  to  do  it;  but  you  expect  something, 
and  shall  have  a  notelet.  Is  Sunday,  not  divinely  speaking, 
but  humanly  and  holydaisically,  a  blessing?  Without  its  insti- 
tution, would  our  rugged  taskmasters  have  given  us  a  leisure 
day,  so  often,  think  you,  as  once  in  a  month  ?  or,  if  it  had  not 
been  instituted,  might  not  they  have  given  us  every  sixth  day  ? 
Solve  me  this  problem : — If  we  are  to  go  three  times  a  day  to 
church,  why  has  Sunday  slipped  into  the  notion  of  a  holy  day  ? 
A  HoLY-day  I  grant  it.  The  Puritans,  I  have  read  in  South- 
ey's  book,  knew  the  distinction.  They  made  people  observe 
Sunday  rigorously,  would  not  let  a  nursery-maid  walk  out  in 
the  fields  with  children  for  recreation  on  that  day.  But,  then 
— they  gave  the  people  a  holyday  from  all  sorts  of  work  every 
second  Tuesday.  This  was  giving  to  the  two  Caesars  that 
which  was  his  respective.  Wise,  beautiful,  thoughtful,  gener- 
ous legislators  I  Would  Wilberforce  give  us  our  Tuesdays? 
No !  he  would  turn  the  six  days  into  sevenths, 

'  And  those  three  smiling  seasons  of  the  year 
Into  a  Russian  winter.' 

Old  Play. 

"  I  am  sitting  opposite  a  person  who  is  making  strange  dis- 
tortions with  the  gout,  which  is  not  unpleasant — to  me  at 
least.  What  is  the  reason  we  do  not  sympathize  with  pain 
short  of  some  terrible  surgical  operation?  Ilazlitl,  who  boldly 
says  all  he  feels,  avows  that  he  not  only  does  not  pity  sick 
people,  but  he  hates  them.      I  obscurely  recognise  his  mean- 


238  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

ing.  Pain  is  probably  too  selfish  a  consideration,  too  simply 
a  consideration  of  self  attention.  We  pity  poverty,  loss  of 
friends,  &c. — more  complex  things,  in  which  the  sufferer's 
feelings  are  associated  with  others.  This  is  a  rough  thought, 
suggested  by  the  presence  of  gout ;  I  want  head  to  extricate 
and  plane  it.  What  is  all  this  to  your  letter?  I  felt  it  to  be 
a  good  one  ;  but  my  turn,  when  I  write  at  all,  is  perversely  to 
travel  out  of  the  record,  so  that  my  letters  are  anything  but 
answers.  So  you  still  want  a  motto  1  You  must  not  take 
my  ironical  one,  because  your  book,  I  take  it,  is  too  serious 
for  it.  Bickerstaff  might  have  used  it  for  his  lucubrations. 
What  do  you  think  of  Religio-Tremuli  ?  or  Tremebundi  ? 
(for  a  title.)  There  is  Religio-Medici  and  Religio-Laici. 
But  perhaps  the  volume  is  not  quite  Quakerish  enough,  or  ex- 
clusively so,  for  it.  Your  own  '  Vigils'  is  perhaps  the  best. 
While  I  have  space,  let  me  congratulate  you  on  the  return  of 
spring,  what  a  summer  spring  too !  all  those  qualms  about  the 
dog  and  crayfish  melt  before  it.  I  am  going  to  be  happy  and 
vain  again. 

"  A  hasty  farewell. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  .Tuly  7th,  1824. 

"Dear  B.  B. — I  have  been  suffering  under  a  severe  inflam- 
mation of  the  eyes,  notwithstanding  which  T  resolutely  went 
through  your  pretty  volume  at  once,  which  I  dare  pronounce  in 
no  ways  inferior  to  former  lucubrations.  'Abroad'' and  *  lord' 
are  vile  rhymes  notwithstanding ;  and,  if  you  count,  you  will 
wonder  how  many  times  you  have  repealed  the  word  unearth- 
ly  ;  thrice  in  one  poem.  It  is  become  a  slang  word  with  the 
bards  :  avoid  in  future  lustily.  '  Time'  is  fine,  but  there  are 
better  a  good  deal,  1  think.  The  volume  does  not  lie  by  me  ; 
and,  after  a  long  day's  smarting  fatigue,  which  has  almost  put 
out  my  eyes  (not  blind,  however,  to  your  merits),  I  dare  not 
trust  myself  with  long  writing.  The  verses  to  Bloomfield  are 
the  sweetest  in  the  collection.  Religion  is  sometimes  lugged 
in,  as  if  it  did  not  come  naturally.  I  will  go  over  carefully 
when  I  get  my  seeing,  and  exemplify.  You  have  also  too 
much  singing  metre,  such  as  requires  no  deep  ear  to  make  ; 
lilting  measure,  in  which  you  have  done  Woolman  injustice. 
Strike  at  less  superficial  melodies.  The  piece  on  Naylor  is 
more  to  my  fancy. 

"  My  eye  runs  waters.  But  T  will  give  you  a  fuller  ac- 
count some  day.     The  book  is  a  very  pretty  one  in  more  than 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  239 

one  sense.     The  decorative  harp,  perhaps,  is  too  ostentatious ; 
a  simple  pipe  preferable. 

"  Farewell,  and  many  thanks. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"August,  1824. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — The  '  Prometheus'  unbound  is  a  capital 
story.  The  literary  rogue  !  What  if  you  had  ordered  '  El- 
frida'  in  sheets  !  she'd  have  been  sent  up,  I  warrant  you.  Or 
bid  him  clasp  his  Bible  (z.  c,  to  his  bosom),  he'd  have  clapped 
on  a  brass  clasp,  no  doubt. 

"  I  can  no  niore  understand  Shelley  than  you  can.  His 
poetry  is  '  thin  sown  with  profit  or  delight.'  Yet  I  must  point 
to  your  notice  a  poem  conceived  and  expressed  with  a  witty 
delicacy.  It  is  that  addressed  to  one  who  hated  him,  but  who 
could  not  persuade  him  to  hale  hi?n  again.  His  coyness  to 
the  other's  passion  (for  hatred  demands  a  return  as  much  as 
love,  and  starves  without  it)  is  most  arch  and  pleasant. 
Pray  like  it  very  much.  For  his  theories  and  nostrums,  they 
are  oracular  enough,  but  I  either  comprehend  'em  not,  or  there 
is  '  miching  malice'  and  mischief  in  'em  ;  but,  for  the  most 
part,  ringing  with  their  own  emptiness.  Hazlitt  said  well  of 
'em — 'Many  are  the  wiser  and  better  for  reading  Shakspeare, 
but  nobody  was  ever  wiser  or  better  for  reading  Shelley.'  I 
wonder  you  will  sow  your  correspondence  on  so  barren  a 
ground  as  1  am,  that  make  such  poor  returns.  But  my  head 
aches  at  the  bare  prospect  of  letter-writing.  I  wish  all  the 
ink  in  the  ocean  dried  up,  and  would  listen  to  the  quills  shiv- 
ering up  in  the  candle-flame  like  parching  martyrs.  'J'he 
same  indisposition  to  write  has  slopped  my  '  EHas,'  but  you 
will  see  a  futile  efllbrt  in  the  next  number,  '  wrung  from  me 
with  slow  pain.'  I  am  dreadfully  indolent.  To  have  to  do 
anything,  to  order  a  new  coat,  for  instance,  though  my  old 
buttons  are  shelled  like  beans,  is  an  effort.  My  pen  stam- 
mers like  my  tongue.  What  cool  heads  those  old  enditers  of 
folios  must  have  had  !  what  a  mortified  pulse  !  Well  ;  once 
more  I  throw  myself  on  your  mercy.  Wishing  peace  to  tiiy 
new  dwelling, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

Mr.  Barton,  having  requested  of  Lamb  some  verses  for  his 
daughter's  album,  received  the  following,  with  the  accompany- 
ing letter  beneath,  on  30th  November  in  this  year.  Purely 
the  neat  loveliness  of  female  Quakerism  never  received  before 
so  delicate  a  compliment ! 


240  LETTERS  TO  BARTON. 


"THE  ALBUM  OF  LUCY  BARTON. 

Little  book,  surnamed  of  white, 
Clean  as  yet,  and  fair  to  sight, 
Keep  thy  attribution  right. 

Never  disproportion'd  scrawl, 
Ugly,  old  (that's  worse  than  all), 
On  thy  maiden  clearness  fall ! 

In  each  letter  here  design'd. 
Let  the  reader  emblem'd  find 
Neatness  of  the  owner's  mind. 

Gilded  margins  count  a  sin  ; 
Let  thy  leaves  attraction  win 
By  the  golden  rules  within; 

Sayings  fetch'd  from  sages  old ; 
Laws  which  Holy  Writ  unfold, 
Worthy  to  be  graved  in  gold : 

Lighter  fancies ;  not  excluding 
Blameless  wit,  with  nothing  rude  in, 
Sometimes  mildly  interluding 

Amid  strains  of  graver  measure  : 
Virtue's  self  hath  oft  her  pleasure 
In  sweet  Muses'  groves  of  leisure. 

Riddles  dark,  perplexing  sense  ; 

Darker  meanings  of  offence  ; 

What  but  shades — be  banish'd  hence ! 

Whitest  thoughts,  in  whitest  dress, 
Candid  meanings  best  express 
Mind  of  quiet  Quakeress." 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

*'  Dear  B.  B. — '  I  am  ill  at  these  numbers  ;'  but,  if  the  above 
be  not  too  mean  to  have  a  place  in  thy  daughter's  sanctum, 
take  them  with  pleasure. 

♦'  I  began  on  another  sheet  of  paper ;  and,  just  as  I  had 
penned  the  second  line  of  stanza  two,  an  ugly  blot  fell  to  il- 
lustrate my  counsel.  I  am  sadly  given  to  blot,  and  modern 
blotting-paper  gives  no  redress ;  it  only  smears,  and  makes  it 
worse.  The  only  remedy  is  scratching  out,  which  gives  it  a 
clerkish  look.  The  most  innocent  blots  are  made  with  red 
ink,  and  are  rather  ornamental.  Marry,  they  are  not  always 
to  be  distinguished  from  the  effusions  of  a  cut  finger !  Well, 
I  hope  and  trust  thy  tick  doleru,  or  however  you  spell  it,  is 
vanished,  for  I  have  frightful  impressions  of  that  tick,  and  do 
altogether  hate  it  as  an  unpaid  score  or  the  tick  of  a  death 
watch.  I  take  it  to  be  a  species  of  Vitus's  dance  (I  omit  the 
Banctity,  writing  to  one  of  the  men  called  friends).     I  knew  a 


LETTER    TO    COLERIDGE.  5i41 

young  lady  who  could  dance  no  other ;  she  danced  it  through 
life,  and  very  queer  and  fantastic  were  her  steps. 

"  Heaven  bless  thee  from  such  measures,  and  keep  thee 
from  the  foul  fiend,  who  delights  to  lead  after  false  fires  in 
the  night,  Flibbertigibbet,  that  gives  the  web,  and  I  forget 
what  else. 

"  From  my  den,  as  Bunvan  has  it. 

"  C.  L." 

Here  is  a  humorous  expostulation  with  Coleridge  for  car- 
rj'ing  away  a  book  from  the  cottage  in  the  absence  of  its  in 
mates. 

TO    MR.  COLERIDGE. 

"  Dear  C. — Why  will  you  make  your  visits,  which  should 
give  pleasure,  matter  of  regret  to  your  friends  ?  You  never 
come  but  you  take  away  some  folio  that  is  part  of  my  ex- 
istence. With  a  great  deal  of  difficulty  I  was  made  to  com- 
prehend the  extent  of  my  loss.  My  maid,  Becky,  brought 
me  a  dirty  bit  of  paper,  which  contained  her  description  of 
some  book  which  Mr.  Coleridge  had  taken  away.  It  was 
'  liUster's  Tables,' which,  for  some  time,  I  could  not  make  out. 
'  What !  has  he  carried  away  any  of  the  tables,  Becky  V  '  No, 
it  wasn't  any  tables,  but  it  was  a  book  that  he  called  Lusters 
Tables.'  I  was  obliged  to  search  personally  among  my 
shelves,  and  a  huge  fissure  suddenly  disclosed  to  me  the  true 
nature  of  the  damage  I  had  sustained.  That  book,  C,  you 
should  not  have  taken  away,  for  it  is  not  mine  ;  it  is  the  prop- 
erty of  a  friend,  who  does  not  know  its  value,  nor,  indeed,  have 
I  been  very  sedulous  in  explaining  to  him  the  estimate  of  it ; 
but  was  rather  contented  in  giving  a  sort  of  corroboration  to  a 
hint  that  he  let  fall,  as  to  its  being  suspected  to  be  not  genuine  ; 
so  that,  in  all  probability,  it  would  have  fallen  to  me  as  a  deo- 
dand  ;  not  but  I  am  as  sure  it  is  Luther's  as  I  am  sure  that  Jack 
Buiiyan  wrote  tlie  '  Pilgrim's  Progress,'  but  it  was  not  for  me 
to  pronounce  upon  the  validity  of  testimony  that  had  been  dis- 
puted by  learneder  clerks  than  I ;  so  I  quietly  let  it  occupy  the 
place  it  had  usurped  ujxin  rny  shelves,  and  should  never  have 
thought  of  issuing  an  ejectment  against  it ;  for  why  should  I 
be  so  bigoted  as  to  allow  riles  of  hospitality  to  none  but  my 
own  books,  children,  &;c.  ?  a  species  of  egotism  I  abhor  from 
my  heart.  No  ;  let  'cm  all  snug  together,  Hebrews  and  Prose- 
lytes of  the  gate  ;  no  selfish  partiality  of  mine  shall  make  dis- 
tinction between  them  ;  I  charge  no  warehouse-room  for  my 
friends'  commodities  ;  they  are  welcome  to  come  and  stay  as 
long  as  thev  like  without  paying  rent.      I  have  several  such 

Vor..  j.->i  r, 


242  LETTER    TO    MISS  HUTCHINSON. 

Strangers  that  I  treat  with  more  than  Arabian  courtesy  ;  there's 
a  copy  of  More's  fine  poem,  which  is  none  of  mine,  but  I 
cherish  it  as  my  own ;  I  am  none  of  those  churlish  landlords 
that  advertise  the  goods  to  be  taken  away  in  ten  days'  lime, 
or  then  to  be  sold  to  pay  expenses.  So  you  see  I  had  no 
right  to  lend  you  that  book ;  1  may  lend  you  my  own  books, 
because  it  is  at  my  own  hazard,  but  it  is  not  honest  to  hazard 
a  friend's  property  ;  I  always  make  that  distinction.  1  hope 
you  will  bring  it  with  you,  or  send  it  by  Hartley  ;  or  he  can 
bring  that,  and  you  the  '  Polemical  Discourses,'  and  come  and 
eat  some  atoning  mutton  with  us  one  of  these  days  shortly. 
We  are  engaged  two  or  three  Sundays  deep,  but  always  dine 
at  home  on  week-days  at  half  past  four.  So  come  all  four — 
men  and  books,  I  mean — my  third  shelf  (northern  compart- 
ment) from  the  top  has  two  devilish  gaps,  where  you  have 
knocked  out  its  two  eye-teeth. 

"  Your  wronged  friend, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  following  preface  to  a  letter,  addressed  to  Miss  Hutch- 
inson, Mrs.  Wordsworth's  sister,  playing  on  the  pretended  de- 
fects of  Miss  Lamb's  handwriting,  is  one  of  those  artifices  of 
affection  which,  not  finding  scope  in  eulogistic  epithets,  takes 
refuge  in  apparent  abuse.  Lamb  himself,  at  this  time,  wrote 
a  singularly  neat  hand,  having  greatly  improved  in  the  India 
House,  where  he  also  learned  to  flourish — a  facility  he  took  a 
pride  in,  and  sometimes  indulged ;  but  his  flourishes  (where- 
fore it  would  be  too  curious  to  inquire)  almost  always  shaped 
themselves  into  a  visionary  corkscrew,  '  never  made  to  draw.' 

TO    MISS    HUTCHINSON. 

*'  Dear  Miss  H. — Mary  has  such  an  invincible  reluctance 
to  any  epistolary  exertion,  that  I  am  sparing  her  a  mortifica- 
tion by  taking  the  pen  from  her.  The  plain  truth  is,  she 
writes  such  a  pimping,  mean,  detestable  hand,  that  she  is 
ashamed  of  the  formation  of  her  letters.  There  is  an  essen- 
tial poverty  and  abjectness  in  the  frame  of  them.  They  look 
like  begging  letters.  And  then  she  is  sure  to  omit  a  most 
substantial  word  in  the  second  draught  (for  she  never  ven- 
tures an  epistle  without  a  foul  copy  first),  which  is  obliged  to 
be  interlined ;  which  spoils  the  neatest  epistle,  you  know. 
Her  figures,  1,2,  3,  4,  &;c.,  where  she  has  occasion  to  express 
numerals,  as  in  the  date  [25th  March,  1824],  are  not  figures, 
but  figurantes  ;  and  the  combined  posse  go  staggering  up  and 
down  shameless  as  drunkards  in  the  daytime.  It  is  no  bet- 
ter when  she  rules  her  paper.     Her  lines  '  are  not  less  er- 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  243 

ring'  than  her  words.  A  sort  of  unnatural  parallel  lines,  that 
are  perpetually  threatening  to  meet;  which,  you  know,  is 
quite  contrary  to  Euclid.  Her  very  blots  are  not  bold  like 
this  [here  a  large  blot  is  inserted],  but  poor  smears,  half  left 
in  and  half  scratched  out,  with  another  smear  left  in  their 
place.  I  like  a  clear  letter.  A  bold  free  hand  and  a  fearless 
flourish.  Then  she  has  always  to  go  through  them  (a  second 
operation)  to  dot  her  i's  and  cross  her  ^'s.  I  don't  think  she 
can  make  a  corkscrew  if  she  tried,  which  has  such  a  fine  ef- 
fect at  the  end  or  middle  of  an  epistle,  and  fills  up. 

"  There  is  a  corkscrew !  One  of  the  best  I  ever  drew. 
By-the-way,  what  incomparable  whiskey  that  was  of  M 's  ! 
But,  if  I  am  to  write  a  letter,  let  me  begin,  and  not  stand  flour- 
ishing like  a  fencer  at  a  fair. 

"It  gives  me  great  pleasure,"  Sic,  &:c.,  &;c. 
[The  letter  now  begins.] 

What  a  strange  mingling  of  humour  and  solemn  truth  is 
there  in  the  following  reflection  on  Fauntleroy's  fate,  in  a  let- 
ter addressed  to  Bernard  Barton  ! 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 
*  *  *  *  *  # 

"  And  now,  my  dear  sir,  trifling  apart,  the  gloomy  catastro- 
phe of  yesterday  morning  prompts  a  sadder  vein.  The  fate 
of  the  unfortunate  Fauntleroy  makes  me,  whether  I  will  or 
no,  to  cast  reflecting  eyes  around  on  such  of  my  friends  as, 
by  a  parity  of  situation,  are  exposed  to  a  similarity  of  tempt- 
ation. My  very  style  seems  to  myself  to  become  more  im- 
pressive than  usual  with  the  charge  of  them.  Who  that 
standeth  Unoweth  but  he  may  yet  fall  ?  Your  hands  as  yet,  I 
am  most  willing  to  believe,  have  never  deviated  into  other's 
property.  You  think  it  impossible  that  you  could  ever  com- 
mit so  heinous  an  offence;  but  so  thought  Fauntleroy  once; 
so  have  thought  many  besides  him,  who  at  last  have  expiated 
as  he  haih  done.  You  are  as  yet  upright  ;  but  you  are  a 
banker,  or,  at  least,  the  next  thing  to  it.  I  feel  the  delicacy  of 
the  subject  ;  but  cash  must  pass  through  your  hands,  some- 
times to  a  great  amount.  If  in  an  unguarded  hour — but  I 
will  hope  better.  Consider  the  scandal  it  will  bring  upon 
those  of  your  persuasion.  Thousands  would  go  to  see  a 
Quaker  hanged  that  would  be  indiflerent  to  the  fate  of  a  Pres- 
byterian or  an  Anabaptist.  Think  of  the  eflect  it  would  have 
on  the  sale  of  your  poems  alone,  not  to  mention  higher  con- 
siderations !  I  tremble,  I  am  sure,  at  myself,  when  I  think 
that  so  many  poor  victims  of  the  law.  at  one  time  of  their  life, 


244  MUNDEN. 

made  as  sure  of  never  being  hanged  as  I,  in  my  own  pre 
sumption,  am  ready,  too  ready,  to  do  myself.  "What  are  we 
better  than  they  ?  Do  we  come  into  the  world  with  dif- 
ferent necks  ?  Is  there  any  distinctive  mark  under  our  left 
ears  ?  Are  we  unstrangulable,  I  ask  you  1  Think  on  these 
things.  1  am  shocked  sometimes  at  the  shape  of  my  own 
fingers,  not  for  their  resemblance  to  the  ape  tribe  (which  is 
something),  but  for  the  exquisite  adaptation  of  them  to  the 
purposes  of  picking,  fingering,  Slc. 

"  No  one  that  is  so  framed,  I  maintain  it,  but  should  trem- 
ble. C.  L." 

In  the  year  1824  one  of  Lamb's  last  ties  to  the  theatre,  as 
a  scene  of  present  enjoyment,  was  severed.  Munden,  the 
rich  peculiarities  of  whose  acting  he  has  embalmed  in  one  of 
the  choicest  "  Essays  of  Elia,"  left  the  stage  in  the  mel- 
lowness of  his  powers.  His  relish  for  Munden's  acting  was 
almost  a  new  sense  ;  he  did  not  compare  him  with  the  old 
comedians,  as  having  common  qualities  with  them,  but  regard- 
ed him  as  altogether  of  a  different  and  original  style.  On  the 
last  night  of  his  appearance  Lamb  was  very  desirous  to  at- 
tend, but  every  place  in  the  boxes  had  long  been  secured  ; 
and  Lamb  was  not  strong  enough  to  stand  the  tremendous 
rush,  by  enduring  which,  alone,  he  could  hope  to  obtain  a  place 
in  the  pit ;  when  Munden's  gratitude  for  his  exquisite  praise 
anticipated  his  wish,  by  providing  for  him  and  iViiss  Lamb 
places  in  a  corner  of  the  orchestra,  close  to  the  stage.  The 
play  of  the  "Poor  Gentleman,"  in  which  Munden  played  "Sir 
Robert  Bramble,"  had  concluded,  and  the  audience  were  im- 
patiently waiting  for  the  farce,  in  which  the  great  comedian 
was  to  delight  them  for  the  last  time,  when  my  attention  was 
suddenly  called  to  Lamb  by  Miss  Kelly,  who  sat  Avith  my  party 
far  withdrawn  into  the  obscurity  of  one  of  the  upper  boxes,  but 
overlooking  the  radiant  hollow  which  waved  below  us,  to  our 
friend.  In  his  hand,  directly  beneath  the  line  of  stage  lights, 
glistened  a  huge  porter  pot,  which  he  was  draining  ;  while  the 
broad  face  of  old  Munden  was  seen  thrust  out  from  the  door 
by  which  the  musicians  enter,  watching  the  close  of  the 
draught,  when  he  might  receive  and  hide  the  portentous  beak- 
er from  the  gaze  of  the  admiring  neighbours.  Some  unknown 
benefactor  had  sent  four  pots  of  stout  to  keep  up  the  veteran's 
heart  during  his  last  trial ;  and,  not  able  to  drink  them  all,  he  be- 
thought him  of  Lamb ;  and  without  considering  the  wonder 
which  would  be  excited  in  the  brilliant  crowd  who  surrounded 
him,  conveyed  himself  the  cordial  chalice  to  Lamb's  parched 
lips.  At  the  end  of  the  same  farce  Munden  found  himself  unable 


MEMOIR    OF    LISTON.  245 

to  deliver,  from  memory,  a  short  and  elegant  address  which 
one  of  his  sons  had  written  for  him  ;  but,  provided  against  ac- 
cidents, took  it  from  his  pocket,  wiped  his  eyes,  put  on  his 
spectacles,  read  it,  and  made  his  last  bow.  This  was,  per- 
haps, the  last  night  when  Lamb  took  a  hearty  interest  in  the 
present  business  scene  ;  for  though  he  went  now  and  then  to 
the  theatre  to  gratify  Miss  Isola,  or  to  please  an  author  who 
Avas  his  friend,  his  real  stage  henceforth  only  spread  itself  out 
in  the  selectest  chambers  of  his  memory. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

[1825.] 
,     Lamb's  Emancipation  from  the  India  House. 

The  year  1825  is  marked  by  one  of  the  principal  events  m 
Lamb's  uneventful  life — his  retirement  from  the  drudgery  of 
the  desk,  with  a  pension  equal  to  two  thirds  of  his  now  liber- 
al salary.  The  following  letters  vividly  exhibit  his  hopes 
and  his  apprehensions  before  he  received  this  noble  boon  from 
the  East  India  Company,  and  his  bewilderment  of  pleasure 
when  he  found  himself  in  reality  free.  He  has  recorded  his 
feelings  in  one  of  the  most  beautiful  of  his  "  Last  Essays  of 
Elia,"  entitled  "  The  Superannuated  Man  ;"  but  it  will  be  in- 
teresting to  contemplate  them,  "  living  as  they  rose,"  in  the 
unstudied  letters  to  which  this  chapter  is  devoted. 

A  new  series  of  the  London  Magazine  was  commenced 
with  this  year,  in  an  increased  size  and  price  ;  but  the  spirit 
of  the  work  had  evaporated,  as  often  happens  to  periodical 
works,  as  the  store  of  rich  fancies  with  which  its  contributors 
had  begun  was  in  a  measure  exhausted.  Lamb  contributed 
a  "  Memoir  of  liiston,"  who  occasionally  enlivened  Latnb's 
evening  parties  with  his  society  ;  and  who,  besides  the  inter- 
est which  he  derived  from  his  theatrical  fame,  was  recom- 
mended to  Lamb  by  the  cordial  admiration  he  expressed  for 
Munden,  whom  he  used  to  imitate  in  a  style  delightfully  blend- 
ing his  own  humour  with  that  of  his  some  time  rival.  The 
"  Memoir"  is  altogether  a  fiction — of  which,  as  Lamb  did  not 
think  it  worthy  of  republication,  I  will  only  give  a  specimen. 
After  a  ludicrously  improbable  account  of  his  hero's  pedigree, 
birth,  and  early  habits.  Lamb  thus  represents  his  entrance  on 
the  life  of  an  actor. 
21* 


246  MEMOIR    OF    LISTON. 

"  We  accordingly  find  him  shortly  after  making  his  debut, 
as  it  is  called,  upon  the  Norwich  boards,  in  the  season  of  that 
year,  being  then  in  the  twenty-second  year  of  his  age.  Hav- 
ing a  natural  bent  to  tragedy,  he  chose  the  part  of  '  Pyrrhus' 
in  the  '  Distressed  Mother,'  to  Sally  Parker's  '  Hermione.' 
We  find  him  afterward  as  '  Barnwell,'  '  Altamont,'  '  Chamont,' 
&c.;  but,  as  if  nature  had  destined  him  to  the  sock,  an  una- 
voidable infirmity  absolutely  discapacitaied  him  for  tragedy. 
His  person,  at  this  latter  period  of  which  I  have  been  speak- 
ing, was  graceful,  and  even  commanding;  his  countenance 
set  to  gravity  ;  he  had  the  power  of  arresting  the  attention  of 
an  audience  at  first  sight  almost  beyond  any  other  tragic  actor. 
But  he  could  not  hold  it.  To  understand  this  obstacle,  M'e  must 
go  back  a  few  years,  to  those  appalling  reveries  at  Cham- 
wood.  Those  illusions,  which  had  vanished  before  the  dis- 
sipation of  a  less  recluse  life  and  more  free  society,  now  in 
his  solitary  tragic  studies,  and  amid  the  intense  calls  upon 
feeling  incident  to  tragic  acting,  came  back  upon  him  with 
tenfold  vividness.  In  the  midst  of  some  most  pathetic  passage 
— the  parting  of  Jaffier  with  his  dying  friend,  for  instance — he 
would  suddenly  be  surprised  with  a  violent  fit  of  horse  laughter. 
While  the  spectators  were  all  sobbing  before  him  with  emo- 
li(m,  suddenly  one  of  those  grotesque  faces  would  peep  out 
upon  him,  and  he  could  not  resist  the  impulse.  A  timely  ex- 
cuse once  or  twice  served  his  purpose,  but  no  audiences  could 
be  expected  to  bear  repeatedly  this  violation  of  the  continuity 
of  feehng.  He  describes  them  (the  illusions)  as  so  many  de- 
mons haunting  him,  and  paralyzing  every  effort.  Even  now, 
I  am  told,  he  cannot  recite  the  famous  soliloquy  in  Hamlet, 
even  in  private,  without  immoderate  bursts  of  laughter.  How- 
ever, what  he  had  not  force  of  reason  sufficient  to  overcome,  he 
had  good  sense  enough  to  turn  to  emolument,  and  determined 
to  make  a  commodity  of  his  distemper.  He  prudently  ex- 
changed the  buskin  for  the  sock,  and  the  illusions  instantly 
ceased  ;  or,  if  they  occurred  for  a  short  season,  by  their  very 
co-operation  added  a  zest  to  his  comic  vein  ;  some  of  his  most 
catching  faces  being  (as  he  expresses  it)  little  more  than  tran- 
scripts and  copies  of  those  extraordinary  phantasmata." 

He  completed  his  half  century  on  the  day  when  he  ad- 
dressed the  following  letter 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  10th  February,  1825. 
"  Dear  B.  B. — ^The  '  Spirit  of  the  Age'  is  by  Hazlitt,  the 
characters  of  Coleridge,  <fec.,  he  had  done  better  in  former 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  247 

publications,  the  praise  and  the  abuse  much  stronger,  &;c., 
but  the  new  ones  are  capitally  done.  Home  Tooke  is  a  match- 
less portrait.  My  advice  is,  to  borrow  it  rather  than  buy  it. 
I  have  it ;  he  has  laid  too  many  colours  on  my  likeness  ;  but  I 
have  had  so  much  injustice  done  me  in  my  own  name,  that  I 
make  a  rule  of  accepting  as  much  over-measure  to  Ella  as 
gentlemen  think  proper  to  bestow.  Lay  it  on,  and  spare  not. 
Your  gentleman  brother  sets  my  mouth  a  watering  after  liberty. 
Oh  that  1  were  kicked  out  of  Leadenhall,  with  every  mark  of 
indignity,  and  a  competence  in  my  fob.  The  birds  of  the  air 
would  not  be  so  free  as  I  should.  How  I  would  prance  and 
curvet  it,  and  pick  up  cowslips,  and  ramble  about  purposeless 
as  an  infant !  The  author-nometer  is  a  good  fancy.  I  have 
caused  great  speculation  in  the  dramatic  (not  thy)  world  by  a 
lying  '  Life  of  Liston,'  all  pure  invention.  The  town  has 
swallowed  it,  and  it  is  copied  into  newspapers,  playbills,  <Sic., 
as  authentic.  You  do  not  know  the  droll,  and,  probably,  missed 
reading  the  article  (in  our  first  number,  new  series).  A  life 
more  improbable  for  him  to  have  lived  could  not  be  easily  in- 
vented. But  your  rebuke,  coupled  with  '  Dreams  on  J.  Bun- 
yan,'  checks  me.  I'd  rather  do  more  in  my  favourite  way, 
but  feel  dry.  I  must  laugh  sometimes.  I  am  poor  Hypo- 
chondriachus,  and  not  Liston. 

"  I  have  been  harassed  more  than  usually  at  office,  which 
has  stopped  my  correspondence  lately.  I  write  with  a  confused 
aching  head,  and  you  must  accept  this  apology  for  a  letter. 

*'  1  will  do  something  soon,  if  I  can,  as  a  peace-offering  to  the 
queen  of  the  East  Angles — something  she  shan't  scold  about. 

"  For  the  present,  farewell. 

"  Thine,  C.  L." 

Freedom  now  gleamed  on  him,  and  he  became  restless 
with  the  approach  of  deliverance. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  March,  1825. 
"Dear  B.  B. — I  have  had  no  impulse  to  write,  or  attend  to 
any  single  object  but  myself  for  weeks  past — my  single  self,  I 
by  myself — I.  I  am  sick  of  hope  deferred.  The  grand  wheel 
is  in  agitation  that  is  to  turn  up  my  fortune  ;  but  round  it 
rolls,  and  will  turn  up  nothing.  I  have  a  glimpse  of  freedom, 
of  becoming  a  gentleman  at  large  ;  but  I  am  put  off  from  day 
to  day.  I  have  offered  my  resignation,  and  it  is  neither  ac- 
cepted nor  rejected.  Eight  weeks  am  I  kept  in  this  fearful 
suspense.     Guess  what  an  absorbing  state  1  feel  it.     I  am 


248  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

not  conscious  of  the  existence  of  friends  present  or  absent 
The  East  India  Directors  alone  can  be  that  thing  to  me  or  not, 
I  have  just  learned  that  nothing  will  be  decided  this  week. 
Why  the  next  1  Why  any  week  ?  It  has  fretted  me  into  an 
itch  of  the  fingers  ;  I  rub  'em  against  paper,  and  write  to  you, 
rather  than  not  allay  this  scorbuta. 

"  While  I  can  write,  let  me  abjure  you  to  have  no  doubts  of 
Irving.  Let  Mr.  M drop  his  disrespect.  Irving  has  pre- 
fixed a  dedication  (of  a  missionary  subject,  first  part)  to  Cole- 
ridge, the  most  beautiful,  cordial,  and  sincere.  He  there 
acknowledges  his  obligation  to  S.  T.  C.  for  his  knowledge  of 
Gospel  truths,  the  nature  of  a  Christian  Church,  Slc,  to  the 
talk  of  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  (at  whose  Gamaliel  feet  he 
sits  weekly)  rather  than  to  that  of  all  the  men  living.  This 
from  him,  the  great  dandled  and  petted  sectarian — to  a  reli- 
gious character  so  equivocal  in  the  worlds  eye  as  that  of  S. 
T.  C,  so  foreign  to  the  kirk's  estimate — can  this  man  be  a 
quack?  The  language  is  as  affecting  as  the  spirit  of  the 
dedication.  Some  friend  told  him,  '  This  dedication  will  do 
you  no  good,'  i.  e.,  not  in  the  world's  repute,  or  with  your  own 
people.     *  That  is  a  reason  for  doing  it,'  quoth  Irving. 

"  I  am  thoroughly  pleased  with  him.  He  is  firm,  outspeak- 
ing, intrepid,  and  docile  as  a  pupil  of  Pythagoras.  You  must 
like  him. 

"  Yours,  in  tremours  of  painful  hope, 

''  C.  Lamb." 

These  tremours  of  painful  hope  were  soon  changed  into 
certain  joy.  The  following  letters  contain  his  own  expressions 
of  delight  on  his  deliverance,  as  conveyed  to  several  of  his 
dearest  friends.  In  the  first  his  happiness  is  a  little  checked 
by  the  death  of  Mr.  Monkhouse,  a  relation  of  Mrs.  Words- 
worth, who  had  gradually  won  Lanib's  affections,  and  who 
nobly  deserved  them. 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"  Colebrook  Cottage,  6th  April,  1825. 
"Dear  Wordsworth — I  have  been  several  times  meditating 
a  letter  to  you  concerning  the  good  thing  which  has  befallen 
me,  but  the  thought  of  poor  Monkhouse  came  across  me.  He 
was  one  that  I  had  exulted  in  the  prospect  of  congratulating 
me.  He  and  you  were  to  have  been  the  first  participators, 
for,  indeed,  it  has  been  ten  weeks  since  the  first  motion  of  it. 
Here  am  I,  then,  after  thirty-three  years'  slavery,  sitting  in  my 
own  room  at  eleven  o'clock  this  finest  of  all  April  mornings, 
a  freed  man,  with  441/.  a  year  for  the  remainder  of  my  life, 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  249 

live  I  as  long  as  John  Dennis,  who  outlived  his  annuity  and 
starved  at  ninety  :  441/.,  i.  c,  450/  ,  with  a  deduction  of  9/.  for 
a  provision  secured  to  my  sister,  she  being  surviver,  the  pen- 
sion guaranteed  by  Act  Georgii  Tertii,  &;c. 

"  I  came  home  for  ever  on  Tuesday  in  last  week.  The 
incomprehensibleness  of  my  condition  overwhelmed  me.  It 
was  like  passing  from  life  into  eternity.  Every  year  to  be 
as  long  as  three,  i.  e.,  to  have  three  times  as  much  real  time — 
time  that  is  my  own,  in  it !  I  wandered  about  thinking  I  was 
happy,  but  feeling  1  was  not.  But  that  tumultuousness  is  pass- 
ing off,  and  1  begin  to  understand  the  nature  of  the  gift  Holy- 
days,  even  the  annual  month,  were  always  uneasy  joys  with 
their  conscious  fugitiveness  ;  the  craving  after  making  the 
most  of  them.  Now,  when  all  is  holyday,  there  are  no  holy- 
days,  f  can  sit  at  home,  in  rain  or  shine,  without  a  restless 
impulse  for  walkings.  I  am  daily  steadying,  and  shall  soon 
find  it  as  natural  to  me  to  be  my  own  master  as  it  has  been 
irksome  to  have  had  a  master.  Mary  wakes  every  mornino- 
with  an  obscure  feeling  that  some  good  has  happened  to  us. 

" and  ,   after    their  releasements,  describe    the 

shock  of  their  emancipation  much  as  I  feel  mine.  But  it  hurt 
their  frames.  I  eat,  drink,  and  sleep  sound  as  ever.  I  lay 
no  anxious  schemes  for  going  hither  and  thither,  but  take 
things  as  they  occur.  Yesterday  I  excursioned  twenty  miles  ; 
to-day  I  write  a  few  letters.  Pleasuring  was  for  fugitive 
playdays,  mine  are  fugitive  only  in  the  sense  that  life  is  fu- 
gitive.    Freedom  and  life  coexistent ! 

'•At  the  foot  of  such  a  call  upon  you  for  gratulation,  I  am 
ashamed  to  advert  to  that  melancholy  event.  Monkhouse 
was  a  character  I  learned  to  love  slowly,  but  it  grew  upon 
me,  yearly,  monthly,  daily.  What  a  chasm  has  it  made  in 
our  pleasant  parties  !  His  noble  friendly  face  was  always 
coming  before  me,  till  this  hurrying  event  in  my  life  came, 
and,  for  the  time,  has  absorbed  all  interest;  in  fact,  it  has  sha- 
ken me  a  little.  My  old  desk  companions,  with  whom  I  have 
had  such  merry  hours,  seem  to  reproach  me  for  removing  my 
lot  from  among  them.  They  were  pleasant  creatures  ;  but  to 
the  anxieties  of  business,  and  a  weight  of  j)()ssible  worse 
ever  impending,  I  was  not  equal.  Indeed,  this  last  winter  I 
was  jaded  out — winters  were  always  worse  than  other  parts 
of  the  year,  because  the  spirits  are  worse,  and  I  liadno  day- 
light. In  summer  I  had  daylight  evenings.  The  relief  was 
hinted  to  me  from  a  superior  power  when  I,  poor  slave,  had 
not  a  hope  but  that  I  must  wait  another  seven  years  with 
Jacob — and  lo  !   the  Rachel  which  I  coveted  is  brought  tome. 

"  Have  you  read  the  noble  dedication  of  Irving's  '  Mission- 

L  3 


250  LETTER    TO    BARTON. 

ary  Orations'  to  S.  T.  C.  ?  Who  shall  call  this  man  a  quack 
hereafter  ?  What  the  kirk  will  think  of  it  neither  I  nor  Ir- 
ving care.  When  somebody  suggested  to  him  that  it  would 
not  be  likely  to  do  him  good,  videlicet,  among  his  own  people, 
'  That  is  a  reason  for  doing  it,'  was  his  noble  answer.  That 
Irving  thinks  he  has  profited  mainly  by  S.  T.  C,  I  have  no 
doubt.     The  very  style  of  the  dedication  shows  it. 

"  Communicate  my  news  to  Southey,  and  beg  his  pardon 
for  my  being  so  long  acknowledging  his  kind  present  of  the 
'  Church,'  which  circumstances,  having  no  reference  to  him- 
self, prevented  at  the  time.  Assure  him  of  my  deep  respect 
and  friendliest  feelings. 

"  Divide  the  same,  or  rather  each  take  the  whole  to  you — 
I  mean  you  and  all  yours.  To  Miss  Hutchinson  1  must  write 
separate. 

"  Farewell !  and  end  at  last,  long  selfish  letter  ! 

"  C.  Lamb." 

TO    BERNARD     BARTON. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — My  spirits  are  so  tumultuary  with  the  novelty 

of  my  recent  emancipation,  that  I  have  scarce  steadiness  of 

hand,  much  more  mind,  to  compose  a  letter.     I  am  free,  B.  B. 

— free  as  air  ! 

'  The  little  bird  that  wings  the  sky 
Knows  no  such  liberty.' 

I  was  set  free  on  Tuesday  in  last  week  at  four  o'clock.  I 
came  home  for  ever  ! 

"  I  have  been  describing  my  feelings  as  well  as  I  can  to 
Wordsworth  in  a  long  letter,  and  don't  care  to  repeat.  Take 
it  briefly,  that  for  a  (ew  days  I  was  painfully  oppressed  by  so 
mighty  a  change,  but  it  is  becoming  daily  more  natural  to  me. 
I  went  and  sat  among  'em  all  at  my  old  thirty-three-years' 
desk  yester  morning ;  and,  dense  take  me,  if  I  had  not  yearn- 
ings at  leaving  all  my  old  pen-and-ink  fellows,  merry,  sociable 
lads,  at  leaving  them  in  the  lurch,  fag,  fag,  fag !  The  com- 
parison of  my  own  superior  felicity  gave  me  anything  but 
pleasure. 

"  B.  B.,  I  would  not  serve  another  seven  years  for  seven 
hundred  thousand  pounds  !  I  have  got  440Z.  nett  for  life, 
sanctioned  by  act  of  parliament,  with  a  provision  for  Mary  if 
she  survives  me.  I  will  live  another  fifty  years  ;  or,  if  I  live 
but  ten,  they  will  be  thirty,  reckoning  the  quantity  of  real 
time  in  them,  i.  c,  the  time  that  is  a  man's  own.  Tell  me 
how  you  like  '  Barbara  S.  ;'*  will  it  be  received  in  atonement 

*  The  true  heroine  of  this  beautiful  story  is  still  living,  though  she  has  left 


LETTER  TO  MISS  HUTCHINSON.  251 

for  the  foolish  '  Vision' — I  mean  by  the  lady  ?  Apropos,  I 
never  saw  Mrs.  Crawford  in  my  life  ;  nevertheless,  it's  all 
true  of  somebody. 

"  Address  me,  in  future,  Colebrooke  cottage,  Islington.  I 
am  really  nervous  (but  that  will  wear  off),  so  take  this  brief 
announcement. 

"  Yours,  truly,  C.  L." 

TO    MISS    HUTCHINSON. 

'•Dear  Miss  Hutchinson — You  want  to  know  all  about  my 
jail  delivery.  'I'ake  it,  then.  About  twelve  weeks  since  I 
had  a  sort  of  intimation  that  a  resignation  might  be  well  ac- 
cepted from  me.  This  was  a  kind  bird's  whisper.  On  that 
hint  I  spake.  G and  T furnished  me  with  certifi- 
cates of  wasted  health  and  sore  spirits — not  much  more  than 
the  truth,  I  promise  you — and  for  nine  weeks  I  was  kept  in  a 
fright.  I  had  gone  too  far  to  recede,  and  they  might  take  ad- 
vantage, and  dismiss  me  with  a  much  less  sum  than  I  had  reck- 
oned on.  However,  liberty  came  at  last,  with  a  liberal  provis- 
ion. I  have  given  up  what  I  could  have  lived  on  in  the  coun- 
try ;  but  have  enough  to  live  here  by  management  and  scrib- 
bling occasionally.  I  would  not  go  back  to  my  prison  for 
seven  years  longer  for  10,000/.  a  year — seven  years  after  one 
ife  fifty  is  no  trifle  to  give  up.  Still  I  am  a  young  pensioner ^ 
and  have  served  but  thirty-three  years  ;  very  few,  I  assure 
you,  retire  before  forty,  forty-five,  or  fifty  years'  service. 

"  You  will  ask  how  I  bear  my  freedom.  Faith,  for  some 
days  I  was  staggered ;  could  not  comprehend  the  magnitude 
of  my  deliverance  ;  was  confused,  giddy ;  knew  not  whether 
I  was  on  my  head  or  my  heel,  as  they  say.  But  those. giddy 
feelings  have  gone  away,  and  my  weather-glass  stands  at  a 
degree  or  two  above 

CONTENT. 

"  I  go  about  quiet,  and  have  none  of  that  restless  hunting 
after  recreation,  which  made  holydays  formerly  uneasy  joys. 
All  being  holydays,  I  feel  as  if  I  had  none,  as  they  do  in 
heaven,  where  'tis  all  red-letter  days.  I  have  a  kind  letter 
from  the  VVordsworlhs,  congratulatory  not  a  little.  It  is  a 
damp,  I  do  assure  you,  amid  all  my  prospects,  that  I  can  re- 
ceive none  from  a  quarter  upon  which  I  had  calculated,  almost 
more  than  from  any,  upon  receiving  congratiihilions.  I  had 
grown  to  like  poor  Monkhouse  more  and  more.      I  do  not  es- 

the  stage.     It  is  enough  to  make  a  severer  Quaker  than  B.  B.  feel  "  that  there 
is  some  soul  of  goodness"  in  players. 


252  LETTER    TO    SOUTHEV. 

teem  a  soul  living  or  not  living  more  warmly  than  I  had  gro\^ 
to  esteem  and  value  him.  But  words  are  vain.  We  hav« 
none  of  us  to  count  upon  many  years.  That  is  the  only  cure 
for  sad  thoughts.  If  only  some  died,  and  the  rest  were  per- 
manent on  earth,  v^^hat  a  thing  a  friend's  death  would  be  then  ! 
*'  I  must  take  leave,  having  put  off  answering  a  load  of  let- 
ters to  this  morning,  and  this,  alas  !  is  the  first.  Our  kindest 
remembrances  to  Mrs.  Monkhouse, 

"  And  believe  us  yours  most  truly, 

''  C.  Lamb. 
"  18th  April,  1825." 

In  this  summer  Lamb  and  his  sister  paid  a  long  visit  to 
Enfield,  which  induced  their  removing  thither  some  time  after- 
ward.    The  following  letter  is  addressed  thence 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

"  19th  August,  1825. 

*'  Dear  Southey — You'll  know  who  this  letter  comes  from 
by  opening  slap  dash  upon  the  text,  as  in  the  good  old  times. 
I  never  could  come  into  the  custom  of  envelopes ;  'tis  a  mod- 
ern foppery ;  the  Plinian  correspondence  gives  no  hint  of 
such.  In  singleness  of  sheet  and  meaning,  then,  I  thank  you 
for  your  little  book.  I  am  ashamed  to  add  a  codicil  of  thanks 
for  your  '  Book  of  the  Church.'  I  scarce  feel  competent  to 
give  an  opinion  of  the  latter  ;  I  have  not  read  enough  of  that 
kind  to  venture  at  it.  I  can  only  say  the  fact,  that  I  have 
read  it  with  attention  and  interest.  Being,  as  you  know,  not 
quite  a  churchman,  I  felt  a  jealousy  at  the  Church  taking  to 
herself  the  whole  deserts  of  Christianity,  Catholic  and  Prot- 
estant, from  Druid  extirpation  downward.  I  call  all  good 
Christians  the  Church,  Capillarians  and  all.  Rut  I  am  in  too 
light  a  humour  to  touch  these  matters.  May  all  our  churches 
flourish !  Two  things  staggered  me  in  the  poem  (and  one 
of  them  staggered  both  of  us).  I  cannot  away  with  a  beauti- 
ful series  of  verses,  as  I  protest  they  are,  commencing  '  Jen- 
ner.'  'Tis  like  a  choice  banquet  opened  with  a  pill  or  an 
electuary — physic  stuff.  T'other  is,  we  cannot  make  out  how 
Edith  should  be  no  more  than  ten  years  old.  By'r  Lady,  we 
had  taken  her  to  be  some  sixteen  or  upward.  We  suppose 
you  have  only  chosen  the  round  number  for  the  metre.  Or 
poem  and  dedication  may  be  both  older  than  they  pretend  to  ; 
but,  then,  some  hint  might  have  been  given  ;  for,  as  it  stands, 
it  may  only  serve  some  day  to  puzzle  the  parish  reckoning. 
But,  without  inquiring  further  (for  'tis  ungracious  to  look  into 
a  lady's  years),  the  dedication  is  eminently  pleasing  and  tender, 


LETTER    TO    SOUTHEY.  263 

and  we  wish  Edith  May  Soulhey  joy  of  it.  Something,  too, 
struck  us  as  if  we  had  heard  of  the  death  of  John  May.  A 
John  May's  death  was  a  few  years  since  in  the  papers.  We 
think  the  tale  one  of  the  quietest,  prettiest  things  we  have 
seen.  You  have  been  temperate  in  the  use  of  localities, 
which  generally  spoil  poems  laid  in  exotic  regions.  You 
mostly  cannot  stir  out  (in  such  things)  for  hummingbirds  and 
fireflies.     A  tree  is  a  magnolia,  &c 

'  Can  I  but  like  the  truly  Catholic  spirit? 
Blame  as  thou  mayst  the  papist's  erring  creed' — 

which,  and  other  passages,  brought  me  back  to  the  old  An- 
thology days,  and  the  admonitory  lesson  to  '  Dear  George'  on 
'  The  Vesper  Bell,'  a  little  poem  which  retains  its  first  hold 
upon  me  strangely. 

"  The  compliment  to  the  translatress  is  daintly  conceived. 
Nothing  is  choicer  in  that  sort  of  writing  than  to  bring  in  some 
remote,  impossible  parallel — as  between  a  great  empress  and 
the  inobtrusive  quiet  soul  who  digged  her  noiseless  way  so 
perseveringly  through  that  rugged  Paraguay  mine.  How  she 
Dobrizhoffered  it  all  out,  it  puzzles  ray  slender  Latinity  to 
conjecture.  Why  do  yon  seem  to  sanction  Landor's  allego- 
rizing away  of  honest  Quixote  !  He  may  as  well  say  Strap 
is  meant  to  symbolize  the  Scottish  nation  before  the  Union, 
and  Random  since  that  act  of  dubious  issue  ;  or  that  Partridge 
means  the  Mystical  Man,  and  Lady  Bellaston  typifies  the 
Woman  upon  Many  Waters.  Gebir,  indeed,  may  mean  the 
state  of  the  hop-markets  last  month,  for  anything  I  know  to 
the  contrary.  That  all  Spain  overflowed  with  romancical 
books  (as  Madge  Newcastle  calls  them)  was  no  reason  that 
Cervantes  should  not  smile  at  the  matter  of  them  ;  nor  even  a 
reason  that,  in  another  mood,  he  might  not  multiply  them, 
deeply  as  he  was  tinctured  with  the  essence  of  them.  Quix- 
ote is  the  father  of  gentle  ridicule,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the 
very  depository  and  treasury  of  chivalry  and  highest  notions. 
Marry,  when  somebody  persuaded  Cervantes  that  he  meant 
only  fun,  and  put  him  upon  writing  that  urifortimatc  second 
part,  with  the  confederacies  of  that  unworthy  duke  and  most 
contemptible  duchess,  Cervantes  sacrificed  his  instinct  to  his 
understanding. 

"  We  got  your  little  book  but  last  night,  being  at  Enfield, 
to  which  j)lace  we  came  about  a  month  since,  and  are  having 
r|uict  holydays.  Mary  walks  her  twelve  miles  a  day  some 
days,  and  I  my  twenty  on  others.  'Tis  all  iiolyday  with  me 
now,  you  know.     The  change  works  admirably. 

"  For  literary  news,  in  my  poor  way,  f  have  a  one-act  farce 
22 


254  LETTER    TO    SOUTHEY. 

going  to  be  acted  at  Haymarket ;  but  when?  is  the  question. 
'Tis  an  extravaganza,  and  like  enough  to  follow  Mr.  H.  '  The 
London  Magazine'  has  shifted  its  publishers  once  more,  and 
I  shall  shift  myself  out  of  it.  It  is  fallen.  My  ambition  is 
not  at  present  higher  than  to  write  nonsense  for  the  play- 
houses, to  eke  out  a  something  contracted  income.  Tempus 
erat.  There  was  a  time,  my  dear  Cornwallis,  when  the 
Muse,  &c.     But  I  am  now  in  Mac  Flecno's  predicament — 

'  Promised  a  play,  and  dwindled  to  a  farce.' 

"  Coleridge  is  better  (was,  at  least,  a  few  weeks  since) 
than  he  has  been  for  years.  His  accomplishing  his  book  at 
last  has  been  a  source  of  vigour  to  him.  We  are  on  a  half 
visit  to  his  friend  Allsop,  at  a  Mrs.  Leishman's,  Enfield,  but 
expect  to  be  at  Colebrooke  cottage  in  a  week  or  so,  where, 
or  anywhere,  I  shall  be  always  most  happy  to  receive  tidings 
from  you.  G.  Dyer  is  in  the  height  of  an  uxorious  paradise. 
His  honeymoon  will  not  wane  till  he  wax  cold.  Never  was 
a  more  happy  pair,  since  Acme  and  Septimius,  and  longer. 
Farewell,  with  many  thanks,  dear  S.  Our  loves  to  all  round 
your  Wrekin. 

"  Your  old  friend, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  farce  referred  to  in  this  letter  was  founded  on  Lamb's 
essay  "  On  the  Inconvenience  of  being  Hanged."  It  was, 
perhaps,  too  slight  for  the  stage,  and  never  was  honoured  by 
a  trial ;  but  was  ultimately  published  in  "  Blackwood's  Mag- 
azine." 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

[1826  to  1828.] 
Letters  to  Robinson,  Carey,  Coleridge,  Patmore,  Procter,  and  Barton. 

When  the  first  enjoyment  of  freedom  was  over,  it  may  be 
doubted  whether  Lamb  was  happier  for  the  change.  He 
lost  a  grievance  on  which  he  could  lavish  all  the  fantastical 
exaggeration  of  a  suflTerer  without  wounding  the  feelings  of 
any  individual,  and  perhaps  the  loss  was  scarcely  compen- 
sated by  the  listless  leisure  which  it  brought  him.  When- 
ever the  facile  kindness  of  his  disposition  permitted,  he  fled 


LAMB    AND    THE    DOG.  255 

h'om  those  temptations  of  society,  which  he  could  only  avoid 
by  flight  ;  and  his  evening  hours  of  solitude  were  hardly  so 
sweet  as  when  they  were  the  reliefs  and  resting-places  of  his 
mind — "glimpses  which  might  make  him  less  forlorn"  of  the 
world  of  poetry  and  romance.  His  mornings  were  chiefly 
occupied  in  long  walks,  sometimes  extending  to  ten  or  twelve 
miles,  in  which  at  this  time  he  was  accompanied  by  a  noble 
dog,  the  property  of  Mr.  Hood,  to  whose  humours  Lamb  be- 
came almost  a  slave,  and  who  at  last  acquired  so  portentous 
an  ascendency,  that  Lamb  requested  his  friend  Mr.  Patmore  to 
take  him  under  his  care.*  At  length  the  desire  of  assisting  Mr. 
Hone  in  his  struggle  to  support  his  family  by  antiquarian  re- 
search and  modern  pleasantry,  renewed  to  him  the  blessing  of 
regular  labour  ;  he  began  the  task  of  reading  through  the  glo- 
rious heap  of  dramas  collected  at  the  British  Museum  under  the 
title  of  the  "  Garrick  Plays,"  to  glean  scenes  of  interest  and 
beauty  for  the  work  of  his  friend  ;  and  the  work  of  kindness 
brought  with  it  its  own  reward. 

"  It  is  a  sort  of  office  work  to  me,"  says  Lamb,  in  a  letter 
to  Barton  ;  "  hours  ten  to  four  the  same.  It  does  me  good. 
Men  must  have  regular  occupation  that  have  been  used  to  it." 

The  Christmas  of  1825  was  a  melancholy  season  for  Lamb. 
He  had  always  from  a  boy  spent  Christmas  in  the  Temple 
with  Mr.  Norris,  an  officer  of  the  Inner  Temple,  and  this 
Christmas  was  made  wretched  by  the  last  illness  of  his  oldest 
friend.  Anxious  to  excite  the  sympathy  of  the  Benchers  of 
the  Inn  for  the  survivers,  Lamb  addressed  the  following  letter 
to  a  friend  as  zealous  as  himself  in  all  generous  offices,  in  order 
that  he  might  show  it  to  some  of  the  Benchers. 

*  The  following  allusion  to  Lamb's  subservience  to  Dash  is  extracted  from 
one  of  a  series  of  papers,  written  in  a  mt)st  cordial  spirit,  and  with  great  char- 
acteristic power,  by  the  friend  to  whom  Dash  was  assigned,  which  appeared 
m  the  "  Court  Magazine."  ''  During  these  interminable  rambles,  heretofore 
pleasant  in  virtue  of  their  profound  loneliness  and  freedom  from  restraint, 
Lamb  made  himself  a  perfect  slave  to  the  dog,  whose  habits  were  of  the 
most  extravag.intly  errant  nature  ;  for,  generally  speaking,  the  creature  was 
half  a  mile  off  from  his  companion  either  before  or  behind,  scouring  the 
fields  or  roads  in  all  directions,  scampering  up  or  down  '  all  manner  of 
streets,'  and  leaving  Lamb  in  a  perfect  fever  of  irritation  and  annoyance;  for 
he  was  afraid  of  losing  the  dog  when  it  was  out  of  sight,  and  yet  could  not 
persuade  himself  to  keep  it  m  sight  for  a  moment  by  curbing  Us  rovmp  spirit. 
Dash  knew  Lamb's  weakness  in  these  particulars  as  well  as  he  did  himself, 
and  took  a  due  doglike  advantage  o(  it.  In  the  Regent's  Park,  m  particular. 
Dash  liad  his  master  completely  at  his  mercy  ;  for  the  moment  they  got  into 
the  ring,  he  used  to  gf  t  through  the  paling  on  to  the  greensward,  and  disap- 
pear for  a  quarter  or  half  an  hour  together,  knowing  perfectly  well  that  Lamb 
did  not  dare  move  from  the  spot  where  he  (Dash)  had  disappeared  (ill  such 
time  as  he  thought  proper  to  show  himself  again.  And  they  used  to  lake  this 
particular  walk  much  oflener  than  they  otherwise  would,  precisely  because 
Dash  liked  it  and  Lamb  did  not."  Under  his  second  master  we  learn  from 
the  same  source  that  Dash  "subsided  into  ihe  best  bred  and  best  behaved  of 
his  species." 


256  LETTER    TO    ROBINSON. 

TO    MR.  H.  C.  ROBINSON. 

"  Colebrooke  Row,  Islington,  Saturday,  20th  Jan.,  1826. 
"  Dear  Robinson — I  called  upon  you  this  morning,  and  found 
you  were  gone  to  visit  a  dying  friend.  I  had  been  upon  a  like 
errand.  Poor  Norris  has  been  lying  dying  for  now  almost  a 
week,  such  is  the  penalty  we  pay  for  having  enjoyed  a  strong 
constitution!  Whether  he  knew  me  or  not,  1  know  not ;  or 
whether  he  saw  me  through  his  poor  glazed  eyes  ;  but  the 
group  I  saw  about  him  I  shall  not  forget.  Upon  the  bed  or 
about  it  were  assembled  his  wife  and  two  daughters,  and  poor 
deaf  Richard,  his  son,  lookingdoubly  stupified.  There  they 
were,  and  seemed  to  have  been  sitting  all  the  week.  I  could 
only  reach  out  a  hand  to  Mrs.  Norris.  Speaking  was  impos- 
sible in  that  mute  chamber.  By  this  time  I  hope  it  is  all  over 
with  him.  In  him  I  have  a  loss  the  world  cannot  make  up. 
He  was  my  friend  and  my  father's  friend  all  the  life  I  can  re- 
member. I  seem  to  have  made  foolish  friendships  ever  since. 
Those  are  friendships  which  outlive  a  second  generation.  Old 
as  1  am  waxing,  in  his  eyes  I  was  still  the  child  he  first  knew 
me.  To  the  last  he  called  me  Charley.  1  have  none  to  call 
me  Charley  now.  He  was  the  last  link  that  bound  me  to  the 
Temple.  You  are  but  of  yesterday.  In  him  seem  to  have 
died  the  old  plainness  of  manners  and  singleness  of  heart. 
Letters  he  knew  nothing  of,  nor  did  his  reading  extend  beyond 
the  pages  of  the  '  Gentleman's  Magazine.'  Yet  there  was  a 
pride  of  literature  about  him  from  being  among  books  (he  was 
librarian),  and  from  some  scraps  of  doubtful  Latin  which  he  had 
picked  up  in  his  office  of  entering  students,  that  gave  him  very 
diverting  airs  of  pedantry.  Can  1  forget  the  erudite  look  with 
which,  when  he  had  been  in  vain  trying  to  make  out  a  black- 
letter  text  of  Chaucer  in  the  Temple  Library,  he  laid  it  down, 
and  told  me  that — 'in  those  old  books,  Charley,  there  is  some- 
times a  deal  of  very  indifferent  spelling ;'  and  seemed  to  con- 
sole himself  in  the  reflection  !  His  jokes,  for  he  had  his 
jokes,  are  now  ended  ;  but  they  were  old  trusty  perennials, 
staples  that  pleased  after  decies  repetita^  and  were  always  as 
good  as  new.  One  song  he  had,  which  was  reserved  for  the 
night  of  Christmas-day,  which  we  always  spent  in  the  Tem- 
ple. It  was  an  old  thing,  and  spoke  of  the  flat  bottoms  of  our 
foes,  and  the  possibility  of  their  coming  over  in  darkness,  and 
alluded  to  threats  of  an  invasion  many  years  blown  over ;  and 
when  he  came  to  the  part 

"  We'll  still  make  'em  run,  and  we'll  still  make  'em  sweat, 
In  spite  of  the  devil  and  Brussels  Gazette  !" 

his  eyes  would  sparkle  as  with  the  freshness  of  au  impending 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  257 

event.  And  what  is  the  Brussels  Gazette  now  ?  I  cry  while 
I  enumerate  these  trifles.  '  How  shall  we  tell  them  in  a 
stranger's  ear  V 

"My  first  motive  in  writing,  and,  indeed,  in  calling  on  you, 
was  to  ask  if  you  were  enough  acquainted  with  any  of  the 
benchers  to  lay  a  plain  statement  before  them  of  the  circum- 
stances of  the  family.  I  almost  fear  not,  for  you  are  of  another 
hall.  But  if  you  can  oblige  me  and  my  poor  friend,  who  is 
now  insensible  to  any  favours,  pray  exert  yourself.  You  can- 
not say  too  much  good  of  poor  Norris  and  his  poor  wife. 

"  Yours  ever, 

"  Charles  Lamb." 

In  the  spring  of  1826,  the  following  letters  to  Bernard  Bar 
ton  were  written. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

''  Dear  B.  B. — I  got  your  book  not  more  than  five  days  ago, 
so  am  not  so  negligent  as  I  must  have  appeared  to  you  with  a 
fornight's  sin  upon  my  shoulders.  I  tell  you  with  sincerity, 
that  1  think  you  have  completely  succeeded  in  what  you  in- 
tended to  do.  What  is  poetry  may  be  disputed — these  are 
poetry  to  me  at  least.  They  are  concise,  pithy,  and  moving  ; 
uniform  as  they  are,  and  unembellished.  I  read  them  through 
at  two  sittings,  without  one  sensation  approaching  to  tedium. 
I  do  not  know  that  among  your  many  kind  presents  of  this 
nature,  this  is  not  my  favourite  volume.  The  language  is 
never  lax,  and  there  is  a  unity  of  design  and  feeling.  You 
wrote  them  with  love — to  avoid  the  coxcombical  phrase,  con 
amore.  I  am  particularly  pleased  with  the  '  Spiritual  Law,' 
pages  34  and  35.  It  reminded  me  of  Quarles,  and  '  holy  Mr. 
Herbert,'  as  Izaak  Walton  calls  him  ;  the  two  best,  if  not  only, 
of  our  devotional  poets,  though  some  prefer  Walts  and  some  Tom 
Moore.  I  am  far  from  well  or  in  my  right  spirits,  and  shud- 
der at  pen-and-ink  work.  I  poke  out  a  monthly  crudity  for 
Colburn  in  his  magazine,  which  I  call  '  Popular  Fallacies,' and 
periodically  crush  a  proverb  or  two,  setting  up  my  folly  against 
the  wisdom  of  nations.     Do  you  see  the  '  New  Mouilily.' 

"  One  word  I  must  object  to  in  your  little  book,  and  it  recurs 
more  than  once — -fadeless  is  no  genuine  compound  ;  loveless 
is,  because  love  is  a  noun  as  well  as  a  verb  ;  but  what  is  a 
fade?  And  I  do  not  quite  like  whipping  the  (ireek  drama 
upon  the  back  of  *  Genesis,'  page  8.  I  do  not  like  praise  hand- 
ed in  by  disparagement ;  as  1  objected  to  a  side  censure  on 
22* 


258  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

Byron,  Sic,  in  the  'Lines  on  Bloomfield.'     With  these  poor 
cavils  excepted,  your  verses  are  without  a  flaw. 

"  C.  Lamb." 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

**  Dear  B.  B. — You  may  know  my  letters  by  the  paper  and 
the  folding.  For  the  former,  I  live  on  scraps  obtained  in 
charity  from  an  old  friend  whose  stationary  is  a  permanent 
perquisite  ;  for  folding,  I  shall  do  it  neatly  when  I  learn  to  tie 
my  neckcloths.  I  surprise  most  of  my  friends  by  writing  to 
them  on  ruled  paper,  as  if  I  had  not  got  past  pothooks  and 
hangers.  Sealing-wax,  I  have  none  on  my  establishment ; 
wafers  of  the  coarsest  bran  supply  its  place.  When  my  epis- 
tles come  to  be  weighed  with  Pliny^s^  however  svperior  to  the 
Roman  in  delicate  irony,  judicious  reflections,  &;c.,  his  gilt 
post  would  bribe  over  the  judges  to  him.  All  the  time  I  was 
at  the  India  House  I  never  mended  a  pen;  I  now  cut  them  to 
the  stumps,  marring  rather  than  mending  the  primitive  goose- 
quill.  I  cannot  bear  to  pay  for  articles  I  used  to  get  for  no- 
thing. (When  Adam  laid  out  his  first  penny  upon  nonpareils 
at  some  stall  in  Mesopotamia,  I  think  it  went  hard  with  him, 
reflecting  upon  his  old  goodly  orchard,  where  he  had  so  many 
for  nothing.)  When  I  write  to  a  great  man  at  the  court  end, 
he  opens  with  surprise  upon  a  naked  note,  such  as  White- 
chapel  people  interchange,  with  no  sweet  degrees  of  enve- 
lope. 1  never  enclosed  one  bit  of  paper  in  another,  nor  under- 
stood the  rationale  of  it.  Once  only  I  sealed  with  borrowed 
wax,  to  set  Sir  Walter  Scott  a  wondering,  impressed  with  the 
imperial  quartered  arms  of  England,  which  my  friend  Field 
hears  in  compliment  to  his  descent,  in  the  female  line,  from 
Oliver  Cromwell.  It  must  have  set  his  antiquarian  curiosity 
upon  watering.  To  your  question  upon  the  currency  I  refer 
you  to  Mr.  Robinson's  last  speech,  where,  if  you  can  find  a 
solution,  I  cannot.  I  think  this,  though,  the  best  ministry  we 
ever  stumbled  upon  ;  gin  reduced  four  shillings  in  the  gallon, 
wine  two  shillings  in  the  quart !  This  comes  home  to  men's 
business  and   bosoms.      My  tirade   against  visiters  was  not 

meant  particularly  at  you  or  A.  K .     I  scarce  know  what 

I  meant,  for  I  do  not  just  now  feel  the  grievance.  I  wanted 
to  make  an  article.  So  in  another  thing  I  talked  of  some- 
body's insipid  wife,  without  a  correspondent  object  in  my 
head:  and  a  good  lady,  a  friend's  wife,  whom  I  really  love 
(don't  startle,  I  mean  in  a  lawful  way),  has  looked  shyly  on 
me  ever  since.  The  blunders  of  personal  application  are  lu- 
dicrous. I  send  out  a  character  now  and  then  on  purpose  to 
exercise   the  ingenuity  of  my  friends.     '  Popular  Fallacies' 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  269 

will  go  on.  A  little  thing  without  name  will  also  be  print- 
ed on  the  Religion  of  the  Actors,  but  it  is  out  of  your  way;  so 
I  recommend  you,  with  true  author's  hypocrisy,  to  skip  it. 
We  are  about  to  sit  down  to  roast  beef,  at  which  we  could 
wish  B.  B.  and  B.  B.'s  daughter  to  be  humble  partakers.  JSo 
much  for  my  hint  at  visiters,  which  was  scarcely  calculated 
for  droppers-in  from  Woodbridge  ;  the  sky  does  not  drop  such 
larks  every  day.  My  very  kindest  wishes  to  you  all,  with  my 
sister's  best  love. 

"C.  Lamb." 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"May  16,  1826. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — 1  have  had  no  spirits  lately  to  begin  a  letter 
to  you,  though  I  am  under  obligations  to  you  (how  many?) 
for  your  neat  little  poem.  'Tis  just  what  it  professes  to  be, 
a  simple  tribute,  in  chaste  verse,  serious  and  sincere. 

"  1  do  not  know  how  Friends  will  relish  it,  but  we  outlyers, 
honorary  friends,  like  it  very  well.  I  have  had  my  head  and 
ears  stuffed  up  with  the  east  winds.  A  continual  ringing  in  my 
brain  of  bells  jangled,  or  the  spheres  touched  by  some  raw 
angel.  Is  it  not  George  the  'rhird  tuning  the  Hundredth 
Psalm?  I  get  my  music  for  nothing.  But  the  weather  seems 
to  be  softening,  and  will  thaw  my  stunnings.  Coleridge,  wri- 
ting to  me  a  week  or  two  since,  began  his  note  :  '  SumTncr 
has  set  in  with  Ids  usual  severity.^  A  cold  summer  is  all  1 
know  disagreeable  in  cold.  I  do  not  mind  the  utmost  rigour 
of  real  winter,  but  these  smiling  hypocritical  Mays  wither  me 
to  death.  My  head  has  been  ringing  chaos,  like  the  day  the 
winds  were  made,  before  they  submitted  to  the  discipline  of 
a  weathercock,  before  the  quarters  were  made.  In  the  street, 
wiih  the  blended  noises  of  life  about  me,  I  hear,  and  my  head 
is  lightened;  but  in  a  room  the  hubbub  comes  back,  and  I  am 
deaf  as  a  sinner.  Did  I  tell  you  of  a  pleasant  sketch  Hood 
has  (lone,  which  he  calls  '  Very  deaf  indeed.^  It  is  of  a  good- 
natured  stupid-looking  old  gentleman,  whom  a  footpad  has 
stopped,  but,  for  his  extreme  deafness,  cannot  niakt^  him  under- 
stand what  he  wants.  The  unconscious  old  gentleman  is  ex- 
tenthng  his  ear-trumpet  very  complacently,  and  the  fellow  is 
firing  a  pistol  into  it  to  make  him  hear,  but  the  ball  will  pierce 
his  scull  sooner  than  the  report  reach  his  sensorinni.  I 
choose  a  very  little  bit  of  paper,  for  my  ear  hisses  when  1 
bend  down  to  write.  1  can  hardly  read  a  book,  for  /  mis,'^  that 
small  soft  voice  which  the  idea  of  articulated  words  raisrs  (al- 
most imperceptibly  to  you)  ?n  a  i>ilriit  reader.  I  snin  too  draf 
to  see  what  I  read.     But  with  a  touch  of  returning  zepliyr  my 


260  LETTtil    TO    COLEiilDGE. 

head  will  melt.  What  lies  you  poets  tell  about  May !  It  is 
the  most  ungenial  part  of  the  year.  Cold  crocuses,  cold 
primroses,  you  take  your  blossoms  in  ice — a  painted  sun. 

Unmeaning  joy  around  appears, 

And  nature  smiles  as  though  she  sneers  ! 

"  It  is  ill  with  me  when  I  begin  to  look  which  way  the 
wind  blows.  Ten  years  ago,  I  literally  did  not  know  the 
point  from  the  broad  end  of  your  vane,  which  it  was  that  in- 
dicated the  quarter.     I  hope  these  ill  winds  have  blown  over 

you  as  they  do  through  me. 

*  *  *i  *  *  * 

"  So  A.  K.  keeps  a  school ;  she  teaches  nothing  wrong,  I'll 
answer  for't.  I  have  a  Dutch  print  of  a  schoolmistress;  sur- 
rounded by  little  oldfashioned  Fleminglings,  with  only  one 
face  among  them.  She  a  princess  of  a  schoolmistress,  wield- 
ing a  rod  for  form  more  than  use  ;  the  scene,  an  old  monastic 
chapel,  with  a  Madonna  over  her  head,  looking  just  as  serious, 
as  thoughtful,  as  pure,  as  gentle  as  herself.  'Tis  a  type  of 
thy  friend. 

"  Yours,  with  kindest  wishes, 

"C.  Lamb." 

About  this  time  a  little  sketch  was  taken  of  Lamb,  and  pub- 
lished. It  is  certainly  not  flattering ;  but  there  is  a  touch  of 
Lamb's  character  in  it.  He  sent  one  of  the  prints  to  Cole- 
ridge, with  the  following  note. 

TO    MR.  COLERIDGE. 

"  Dear  Coleridge — If  I  know  myself,  nobody  more  detests 
the  display  of  personal  vanity,  which  is  implied  in  the  act 
of  sitting  for  one's  picture,  than  myself.  But,  the  fact  is, 
that  the  likeness  which  accompanies  this  letter  was  stolen 
from  my  person  at  one  of  my  unguarded  moments  by  some 
too  partial  artist,  and  my  friends  are  pleased  to  think  that  he 
has  not  much  flattered  me.  Whatever  its  merits  may  be,  you, 
who  have  so  great  an  interest  in  the  original,  will  have  a  satis- 
faction in  tracing  the  features  of  one  that  has  so  long  esteemed 
you.  There  are  times  when,  in  a  friend's  absence,  these  graphic 
representations  of  him  almost  seem  to  bring  back  the  man 
himself.  The  painter,  whoever  he  was,  seems  to  have  taken 
me  in  one  of  those  disengaged  moments,  if  I  may  so  term 
them,  when  the  native  character  is  so  much  more  honestly  dis- 
played than  can  be  possible  in  the  restraints  of  an  enforced 
sitting  attitude.  Perhaps  it  rather  describes  me  as  a  thinking 
man  than  a  man  in  the  act  of  thought.     Whatever  its  preten- 


LETTER    TO    COLERIDGE.  261 

sions,  I  know  it  will  be  dear  to  you,  towards  whom  I  should 
wish  my  thoughts  to  flow  in  a  sort  of  an  undress  rather  than  in 
the  more  studied  graces  of  diction. 

"  I  am,  dear  Coleridge,  yours  sincerely, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

In  the  following  summer  Lamb  and  his  sister  went  on  a 
long  visit  to  Enfield,  which  ultimately  led  to  his  giving  up 
Colebrooke  cottage,  and  becoming  a  constant  resident  at  that 
place.  It  was  a  great  sacrifice  to  him,  who  loved  London  so 
well ;  but  his  sister's  health  and  his  own  required  a  secession 
from  the  crowd  of  visiters  who  pressed  on  him  at  Islington, 
and  whom  he  could  not  help  welcoming.  He  thus  invited 
Mr.  Carey,  now  of  the  British  Museum,  to  look  in  upon  his 
retreat. 

TO    MR.  CAREY. 

"  Dear  Sir — It  is  whispered  me  that  you  will  not  be  un- 
willing to  look  into  our  doleful  hermitage.  Without  more 
preface,  you  will  gladden  our  cell  by  accompanying  our  old 
chums  of  the  London,  Darley  and  A.  C,  to  Enfield  on  Wed- 
nesday. You  shall  have  hermits'  fare,  with  talk  as  seraphical 
as  the  novelty  of  the  divine  life  will  permit,  with  an  innocent 
retrospect  to  the  world  which  we  have  left,  when  I  will  thank 
you  for  your  hospitable  oflier  at  Chiswick,  and,  with  plain  hermit 
reasons,  evince  the  necessity  of  abiding  here. 

"  Without  hearing  from  you,  then,  you  shall  give  us  leave 
to  expect  you.  I  have  long  had  it  on  my  conscience  to  invite 
you,  but  spirits  have  been  low  ;  and  I  am  indebted  to  chance 
for  this  awkward  but  most  sincere  invitation. 

"  Yours,  with  best  loves  to  Mrs.  Carey, 

"  C.  Lamb. 

"  D.  knows  all  about  the  coaches.  Oh  for  a  museum  in  the 
wilderness  !" 

The  following  letter  was  addressed  about  this  time  to  Cole- 
ridge, who  was  seriously  contemplating  a  poetical  panto- 
mime. 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"  Dear  C. — We  will,  with  great  pleasure,  be  with  you  on 
Thursday  in  the  next  week  early.  Your  finding  out  my  style 
in  your  nephew's  pleasant  book  is  surjjri.sing  to  nie.  1  want 
eyes  to  descry  it.  You  are  a  little  too  hard  upon  his  morality, 
though  I  confess  he  has  more  of  Sterne  ahoiil  him  than  Stern- 
hold.     But  he  saddens  into  excellent  sense  before  the  conclu- 


2G2  Tj:Ti-i:i;s  'lo   harton. 

sion.  Your  query  shall  be  submitted  to  Miss  Kelly,  though 
it  is  obvious  that  the  pantomime,  when  done,  will  be  more  easy 
to  decide  upon  than  in  proposal.  I  say,  do  it  by  all  means. 
I  have  Decker's  play  by  me,  if  you  can  filch  anything  out  of 

it.     Miss  G ,  with  her  kitten  eyes,  is  an  actress,  though 

she  show  s  it  not  at  all ;  and  pupil  to  the  former,  whose  ges- 
tures she  mimics  in  comedy  to  the  disparagement  of  her  own 
natural  manner,  which  is  agreeable.  It  is  funny  lo  see  her 
bridling  up  her  neck,  which  is  native  to  F.  K. ;  but  there  is  no 
setting  another's  manners  upon  one's  shoulders  any  more  than 
their  head.  I  am  glad  you  esteem  Manning,  though  you  see 
but  his  husk  or  shrine.  He  discloses  not  save  to  select  wor- 
shippers, and  will  leave  the  world  without  any  one  hardly  but 
me  knowing  how  stupendous  a  creature  he  is.  I  am  perfect- 
ing myself  in  the  '  Ode  to  Eton  College'  against  Thursday,  that 
I  may  not  appear  unclassic.  I  have  just  discovered  that  it  is 
much  better  than  the  '  Elegy.' 

"  In  haste, 

"C.  L. 
"  P.S.  I  do  not  know  what  to  say  to  your  latest  theory  about 
Nero   being  the  Messiah,  though  by  all  accounts  he  was  a 
'nointed  one." 

Lamb's  desire  for  dramatic  success  was  not  even  yet  wholly 
chilled.  In  this  summer  he  wrote  a  little  piece  on  the  story 
of  Crabbe's  tale  of  the  "  Confidant,"  which  was  never  pro- 
duced, but  ultimately  published  in  "  Blackwood's  Magazine." 
It  runs  on  agreeably  in  melodious  blank  verse,  entirely  free 
from  the  occasional  roughnesses  of  "  John  Woodvil,"  but  has 
not  sufficient  breadth  or  point  for  the  stage.  He  alludes  to  it 
in  the  following  letter 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — I  have  not  been  able  to  answer  you,  for  we 
have  had  and  are  having  (I  just  snatch  a  moment)  our  poor 
quiet  retreat,  to  which  we  fled  from  society,  full  of  company. 
Whither  can  I  take  wing  from  the  oppression  of  human  faces? 
W  ould  I  were  in  a  wilderness  of  apes,  tossing  cocoanuts 
about,  grinning  and  grinned  at ! 

"  M was  hoaxing  you,  surely,  about  my  engraving  ;  'tis 

a  little  sixpenny  thing,  too  like  by  half,  in  which  the  draughts- 
man has  done  his  best  to  avoid  flattery,  'i'here  have  been  two 
editions  of  it,  which,  1  think,  are  all  gone,  as  they  have  vanished 
from  the  window  where  they  hung — a  prinishop  corner  of 
Great  and  Little  Queen  streets,  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields — where 
any   London    friend  of  yours    may   inquire   for  it,  for  1  am 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  263 

(thougli  you  loorit  understand  it)  at  Enfield  Chace.  We  have 
been  here  near  three  months,  and  shall  stay  two  more,  if  peo- 
ple will  let  us  alone  ;  but  they  persecute  us  from  village  to 
village.  So,  don't  direct  to  Islington  again  till  further  notice 
I  am  trying  my  hand  at  a  drama,  in  two  acts,  founded  on 
Crabbe's  '  Confidant,'  mutatis  mutandis.  You  like  the  Odys- 
sey; did  you  ever  read  my  '  Adventures  of  Ulysses,'  founded 
on  Chapman's  old  translation  of  it  ?  for  children  or  men. 
Chapman  is  divine,  and  my  abridgment  has  not  quite  emptied 
him  of  his  divinity.  When  you  come  to  town  I  will  show  it 
you.  You  have  well  described  your  old  fashionable  grand  pa- 
ternal hall.  Is  it  not  odd  that  every  one's  earliest  recollec- 
tions are  of  some  such  place?  I  had  my  Blakesware  (Blakes- 
moor  in  the  '  London').  Nothing  fills  a  child's  mind  like  a 
large  old  mansion  :  better  if  un — or  partially — occupied,  peo- 
pled with  the  spirits  of  deceased  members  for  the  county,  and 
justices  of  the  quorum.  Would  I  were  buried  in  the  peopled 
solitude  of  one,  with  my  feelings  at  seven  years  old  !  Those 
marble  busts  of  the  emperors,  they  seemed  as  if  they  were  to 
stand  for  ever,  as  they  had  stood  from  the  living  ages  of  Rome, 
in  that  old  marble  hall,  and  I  to  partake  of  their  permanency. 
Eternity  was  while  I  thought  not  of  time.  But  he  thought 
of  me,  and  they  are  toppled  down,  and  corn  covers  the  spot  of 
the  noble  old  dwelling  and  its  princely  gardens.  I  feel  like  a 
grasshopper  that,  chirping  about  the  grounds,  escapes  his 
scythe  only  by  my  littleness.  Even  now  he  is  whetting  one 
of  his  smallest  razors  to  clean  wipe  me  out,  perhaps.      Well!'* 

The  following  is  an  acknowledgment  of  some  verses  which 
Lamb  had  begged  for  Miss  Isola's  album. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — I  am  thankful  to  you  for  your  ready  compli- 
ance with  my  wishes.  Emma  is  delighted  with  your  verses  ; 
and  I  have  sent  them,  with  four  album  poems  of  my  own,  to  a 
Mr.  F ,  who  is  to  be  the  editor  of  a  more  superb  pocket- 
book  than  has  yet  appeared,  by  far  !  the  property  of  some 
wealthy  booksellers  ;  but  whom,  or  what  its  name,  I  forgot  to 
ask.  It  is  actually  to  have  in  it  schoolboy  exercises  by  his 
present  majesty  and  the  late  Duke  of  York.      Wordsworth  is 

named  as  a  contributor.      F ,  whom  1  have   slightly  se«ni, 

is  editor  of  a   forthcome  or  coming  review  of  foreign  books, 

and  is  intimately  connected  with  Lockhart  and  .     So  1 

take  it  that  this  is  a  concern  of  Murray's.  Walter  Scott  also 
contributes  mainly.  I  have  stood  off  a  long  lime  from  these 
annuals,  which  are  ostentatious  trumpery,  but  could  not  with- 
stand the  request  of  Jameson,  a  particular  friend  of  mine  and 
Coleridge''' 


264  LETTER    TO    P ATM ORE. 

"  I  shall  hate  myself  m  frippery,  strutting  along,  and 

*  Vying  in  finery  with  beaux  and  belles, 
Future  Lord  Byrons  and  sweet  L.  E.  L.'s.' 

Your  taste,  I  see,  is  less  simple  than  mine,  which  the  differ 
ence  in  our  persuasions  has  doubtless  effected.  In  fact,  of 
late  you  have  so  Frenchitied  your  style,  larding  it  with  hors 
de  combat  and  au  desespoirs,  that,  o'  my  conscience,  the  Foxian 
blood  is  quite  dried  out  of  you,  and  the  skipping  monsieur 
spirit  has  been  infused. 

"  If  you  have  anything  you  like  to  send  further,  I  dare  say 
an  honourable  place  would  be  given  to  it ;  but  I  have  not  heard 

from  F since  I  sent  mine,  nor  shall  I  probably  again,  and 

therefore  I  do  not  solicit  it  as  from  him.  Yesterday  I  sent  off 
my  tragi-comedy  to  Mr.  Kemble  ;  wish  it  luck.  I  made  it  all 
('tis  blank  verse,  and,  I  think,  of  the  true  old  dramatic  cut),  or 
most  of  it,  in  the  green  lanes  about  Enfield,  where  I  am,  and 
mean  to  remain,  in  spite  of  your  peremptory  doubts  on  that 
head.  Your  refusal  to  lend  your  poetical  sanction  to  my 
*  Icon,'  and  your  reasons  to  Evans  are  most  sensible.  May- 
be I  may  hit  on  a  line  or  two  of  my  own  jocular,  maybe  not. 
Do  you  never  Londonize  again  ?  I  should  like  to  talk  over  old 
poetry  with  you,  of  which  I  have  much,  and  you,  I  think,  little. 
I  would  willingly  come  and  work  for  you  three  weeks  or  so 
to  let  you  loose.  Would  I  could  sell  or  give  you  some  of  my 
leisure  !  Positively,  the  best  thing  a  man  can  have  to 
DO  IS  nothing  !  and,  next  to  that,  perhaps,  good  works  !  I 
am  but  poorlyish,  and  feel  myself  writing  a  dull  letter ;  poor- 
iyish  from  company;  not  generally,  for  I  never  was  better, 
nor  took  more  walks,  fourteen  miles  a  day  on  an  average,  with 
a  sporting  dog.  Dash.  You  would  not  know  the  plain  poet 
any  more  than  he  doth  recognise  James  Naylor  tricked  out  au 
desespoy  (how  do  you  spell  it  ?). 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  following  was  written  to  the  friend  to  whom  Lamb  had 
intrusted  Dash  a  few  days  after  the  parting. 

to    MR.    PATMORE. 

"  Mrs.  Leishman's,  Chace,  Enfield. 
"  Dear  P. — Excuse  my  anxiety,  but  how  is  Dash  ?     I  should 

have  asked  if  Mrs.  P e  kept  her  rules,  and  was  improving ; 

but  Dash  came  uppermost.  The  order  of  our  thoughts  should 
be  the  order  of  our  writing.  Goes  he  muzzled,  or  aperto  ore  1 
Are  his  intellects  sound,  or  does  he  wander  a  little  in  his  con- 
versation ?  You  cannot  be  too  careful  to  watch  the  first  symp- 
toms of  incoherence.     The  first  illogical  snarl  he  makes,  to 


LETTER    TO    PATMORE.  265 

St.  Luke*s  with  him.  All  the  dogs  here  are  going  mad  if  you 
believe  the  overseers  ;  but,  I  protest,  they  seem  to  me  very  ra- 
tional and  collected.  But  nothing  is  so  deceitful  as  mad  peo- 
ple to  those  who  are  not  used  to  them.  Try  him  with  hot 
water :  if  he  won't  lick  it  up,  it  is  a  sign — he  does  not  like  it. 
Does  his  tail  wag  horizontally  or  perpendicularly  ?  That  has 
decided  the  fate  of  many  dogs  in  Enfield.  Is  his  general  de- 
portment cheerful  ?  I  mean  when  he  is  pleased — for  other- 
wise there  is  no  judging.  You  can't  be  too  careful.  Has  he 
bit  any  of  the  children  yet  ?  If  he  has,  have  them  shot,  and 
keep  him  for  curiosity,  to  see  if  it  was  the  hydrophobia,  'i'hey 
say  all  our  army  in  India  had  it  at  one  time  ;  but  that  was  in 
Hyder-kXWs  time.  Do  you  get  paunch  for  him  ?  Take  care 
the  sheep  was  sane.  You  might  pull  out  his  teeth  (if  he  would 
let  you),  and  then  you  need  not  mind  if  he  were  as  mad 
as  a  bedlamite.     It  would  be  rather  fun  to  see  his  odd  ways. 

It  might  amuse  Mrs.  P and  the  children.     They'd  have 

more  sense  than  he.  He'd  be  like  a  fool  kept  in  a  family,  to 
keep  the  household  in  good-humour  with  their  own  understand- 
ing. You  might  teach  him  the  mad  dance,  set  to  the  mad 
howl.  Madge  Owlet  would  be  nothing  to  him.  '  My  !  how 
he  capers  !'  [In  the  margin  is  written,  '  One  of  the  children 
speaks  this.'*]  ***** 
What  I  scratch  out  is  a  German  quotation  from  Lessing,  on 
the  bite  of  rabid  animals  ;  but  I  remember  you  don't  read  Ger- 
man.    But  Mrs.  P may,  so  1  wish  I  had  let  it  stand. 

The  meaning  in  English  is — 'Avoid  to  approach  an  animal 
suspected  of  madness,  as  you  would  avoid  fire  or  a  precipice,' 
which,  I  thitik,  is  a  sensible  observation.  The  Germans  are 
certainly  profounder  than  we.  If  the  slightest  suspicion  arises 
in  your  breast  that  all  is  not  right  with  him,  muzzle  him  and 
lead  him  in  a  string  (common  packthread  will  do — he  don't 
care  for  twist)  to  Mr.  Hood's,  his  quondam  master,  and  he'll 
take  him  in  at  any  time.  You  may  mention  your  suspicion, 
or  not,  as  you  like,  or  as  you  think  it  may  wound  or  not  Mr. 
H.'s  feelings.  Hood,  I  know,  will  wink  at  a  few  follies  in 
Dash,  in  consideration  of  his  former  sense.  Besides,  Hood 
is  deaf,  and,  if  you  hinted  anything,  ten  to  one  he  would  not 
hear  you.  Besides,  you  will  have  discharged  your  conscience, 
and  laid  the  child  at  the  right  door,  as  they  say. 

"  We  are  dawdling  our  time  away  very  idly  and  pleasantly 
at  a  Mrs.  Leishman's,  Chace,  Enfield,  where,  if  you  come  a 
hunting,  we  can  give  you  cold  meat  and  a  tankard.  Her 
husband  is  a  tailor  ;  but  that,  you  know,  does  not  make  her 

*  Here  three  lines  are  carefully  erased. 
Vol   1—23  M 


266  LETTER    TO    BARTON. 

one.     I  knew  a  jailer  (which  rhymes),  but  his  wife  was  a  fine 
lady. 

"  Let  us  hear  from  you  respecting  Mrs.  P 's  regimen, 

I  send  my  love  in  a to  Dash. 

"  C.  Lamb.*' 

On  the  outside  of  the  letter  is  written : — 

"  Seriously,  I  wish  you  would  call  upon  Hood  when  you 
are  that  way.  He's  a  capital  fellow.  I've  sent  him  two 
poems,  one  ordered  by  his  wife,  and  written  to  order ;  t.nd  'tis 
a  week  since,  and  I've  not  heard  from  him.  I  fear  something 
is  the  matter. 

"  Omitted  within  : 

"  Our  kindest  remembrance  to  Mrs.  P." 

He  thus,  in  December,  expresses  his  misery  in  a  letter 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  My  dear  B.  B. — I  have  scarce  spirits  to  write,  yet  am 
harassed  with  not  writing.  Enfield  and  everything  is  very 
gloomy.  I  feel  most  thankful  for  the  spinsterly  attentions  of 
your  sister.  Thank  that  kind  '  knitter  in  the  sun !'  What 
nonsense  seems  verse  when  one  is  seriously  out  of  hope  and 
spirits  !  I  mean,  that  at  this  time  I  have  some  nonsense  to 
write,  under  pain  of  incivility.  Would  to  the  fifth  heaven  no 
coxcombress  had  ever  invented  albums  ! 

"  I  have  not  received  the  annual,  nor  the  slightest  notice 

from  about  omitting   four  or  five  of  my  things.     The 

best  thing  is  never  to  hear  of  such  a  thing  as  a  bookseller 
again,  or  to  think  there  are  publishers.  Second-hand  station- 
ers and  old  bookstalls  for  me ;  authorship  should  be  an  idea 
of  the  past.  Old  kings,  old  bishops  are  venerable  ;  all  pres- 
ent is  hollow.  I  cannot  make  a  letter.  I  have  no  straw,  not 
a  pennyworth  of  chaff",  only  this  may  stop  your  kind  importu- 
nity to  know  about  us.  There  is  a  comfortable  house,  but  no 
tenants.  One  does  not  make  a  household.  Do  not  think  I 
am  quite  in  despair ;  but,  in  addition  to  hope  protracted,  1 
have  a  stupifying  cold  and  obstructing  headache,  and  the  sun 
is  dead ! 

"  I  will  not  fail  to  apprize  you  of  the  revival  of  a  beam. 

Meantime  accept  this,  rather  than  think  I  have  forgotten  you 
2^[J  "        *  *  *  *  *  * 

A  proposal  to  erect  a  memorial  to  Clarkson,  upon  the  spot 
by  the  wayside  where  he  stopped  when  on  a  journey  from 


LETTER    TO    A    LADY.  267 

Cambridge  to  London,  and  formed  the  great  resolution  of  de- 
voting his  life  to  the  abolition  of  the  slave  trade,  produced 
from  Lamb  the  following  letter  to  the  lady  who  had  announced 
it  to  him  ; — 

"  Dear  Madam — I  return  your  list  with  my  name.  I  should 
be  sorry  that  any  respect  should  be  going  on  towards  Clark- 
son,  and  I  be  left  out  of  the  conspiracy.  Otherwise,  I  frankly 
own  that  to  pillarize  a  man's  good  feelings  in  his  lifetime  is 
not  to  my  taste.  Monuments  to  goodness,  even  after  death, 
are  equivocal.  I  turn  away  from  Howard's,  I  scarce  know 
why.  Goodness  blows  no  trumpet,  nor  desires  to  have  it 
blown.  We  should  be  modest  for  a  modest  man — as  he  is  for 
himself.  The  vanities  of  life — art,  poetry,  skill  military — are 
subjects  for  trophies  ;  not  the  silent  thoughts  arising  in  a  good 
man's  mind  in  lonely  places.  Was  I  Clarkson,  1  should  never 
be  able  to  walk  or  ride  near  the  spot  again.  Instead  of  bread, 
we  are  giving  him  a  stone.  Instead  of  the  locality  recalling 
the  noblest  moment  of  his  existence,  it  is  a  place  at  which 
his  friends  (that  is,  himself)  blow  to  the  world,  '  What  a  good 
man  is  he  !'  I  sat  down  upon  a  hillock  at  Forty  Hill  yester- 
night— a  fine  contemplative  evening — with  a  thousand  good 
speculations  about  mankind.  How  I  yearned  with  cheap 
benevolence  !  I  shall  go  and  inquire  of  the  stonecutter  that 
cuts  the  tombstones  here  what  a  stone  with  a  short  inscrip- 
tion will  cost,  just  to  say, '  Here  C.  Lamb  loved  his  brethren 
of  mankind.'  Everybody  will  come  there  to  love.  As  1  can't 
well  put  my  own  name,  I  shall  put  about  a  subscription: 


Mrs. £0 

5 

0 

Procter,             0 

2 

6 

G.  Dyer,            0 

1 

0 

Mr.  Godwin,     0 

0 

0 

Mrs.  Godwin,    0 

0 

0 

Mr.  Irving, 

a  watch  chain, 

Mr.  

the  proceeds  of  — 

—  first  edition, 

£0     8     6 

"I  scribble  in  haste   from  here,  where  we   shall  be  some 

time.      Pray  request  Mr.  to  advance  the  guinea  for  me, 

which  shall  faithfully  be  forthcoming;  and  pardon  me  that  1 
don't  see  the  proposal  in  quite  the  light  that  he  may.  'J'he 
kindness  of  his  motives,  and  his  power  of  appreciating  the 
passage,  I  thoroughly  agree  in. 

"With  most  kind  regards  to  him,  I  conclude, 
"  Dear  madam,  yours  truly, 

"  C.  Lamb 
"  From  Mrs.  Leishman's,  Chace,  Enfield." 

M  2 


268  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

The  following  appears  to  have  been  written  in  October, 
1828. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  A  splendid  edition  of  '  Bunyan's  Pilgrim !'  Why  the 
thought  is  enough  to  turn  one's  moral  stomach.  His  cockle- 
hat  and  staff  transformed  to  a  smart  cocked  beaver  and  a 
jemmy  cane  ;  his  amice  gray  to  the  last  Regent-street  cut ; 
and  his  painful  palmer's  pace  to  the  modern  swagger.  Stop 
thy  friend's  sacrilegious  hand.  Nothing  can  be  done  for  B. 
but  to  reprint  the  old  cuts  in  as  homely  but  good  a  style  as 
possible.  The  Vanity  Fair  and  the  Pilgrims  there — the 
Silly-soothness  in  his  setting-out  countenance — the  Christian 
Idiocy  (in  a  good  sense)  of  his  admiration  of  the  shepherds 
on  the  Delectable  Mountains  ;  the  lions,  so  truly  allegorical, 
and  remote  from  any  similitude  to  Pidcock's  ;  the  great  head 
(the  author's),  capacious  of  dreams  and  similitudes,  dreaming 
in  the  dungeon.  Perhaps  you  don't  know  my  edition,  what  1 
had  when  a  child.  If  you  do,  can  you  bear  new  designs  from 
Martin,  enamelled  into  copper  or  silver-plate  by  Heath,  ac- 
companied with  verses  from  Mrs.  Hemans's  pen.  Oh  how  un- 
like his  own ! 

Wouldst  thou  divert  thyself  from  melancholy? 
Wouldst  thou  be  pleasant,  yet  be  far  from  folly? 
Wouldst  thou  read  riddles,  and  their  explanation, 
Or  else  be  drown'd  in  thy  contemplation  ? 
Dost  thou  love  picking  meat?   or  wouldst  thou  see 
A  man  i'  the  clouds,  and  hear  him  speak  to  thee  ? 
Wouldst  thou  be  in  a  dream,  and  yet  not  sleep? 
Or  wouldst  thou  in  a  moment  laugh  and  weep  ? 
Or  wouldst  thou  lose  thyself,  and  catch  no  harm, 
And  find  thyself  again  without  a  charm  ? 
Wouldst  read  thyself,  and  read  thou  knowst  not  what, 
And  yet  know  whether  thou  art  bless'd  or  not 
By  reading  the  same  lines?     Oh  then  come  hither, 
And  lay  my  book,  thy  head,  and  heart  together. 

John  Bunyan 

Show  me  such  poetry  in  any  one  of  the  fifteen  forthcoming  com- 
binations of  show  and  emptiness  yclept  '  Annuals.'  So  there's 
verses  for  thy  verses  ;  and  now  let  me  tell  you,  that  the  sight 
of  your  hand  gladdened  me.  I  have  been  daily  trying  to 
write  to  you,  but  paralyzed.  You  have  spurred  me  on  to  this 
tiny  effort,  and  at  intervals  I  hope  to  hear  from  and  talk  to 
you.  But  my  spirits  have  been  in  an  oppressed  way  for  a 
long  time,  and  they  are  things  which  must  be  to  you  of  faiih, 
for  who  can  explain  depression  !  Yes,  I  am  hooked  into  the 
*  Gem,'  but  only  for  some  lines  written  on  a  dead  infant  of  the 
editor's,  which  being,  as  it  were,  his  property,  I  could  not  re- 
fuse their  appearing  ;  but  I  hate  the  paper,  the  type,  the  gloss, 


LETTERS    TO    BARTON.  269 

the  dandy  plates,  the  names  of  contributors  poked  up  into 
your  eyes  in  the  first  page,  and  whisked  through  all  the  covers 
of  magazines,  the  barefaced  sort  of  emulation,  the  immodest 
candidateship,  brought  into  so  little  space.  In  those  old  '  Lon- 
dons,'  a  signature  was  lost  in  the  wood  of  matter,  the  paper 
coarse  (till  latterly,  which  spoiled  them) ;  in  short,  1  detest 
to  appear  in  an  annual.  What  a  fertile  genius  (and  a  quiet 
good  soul  withal)  is  Hood.  He  has  fifty  things  in  hand  ; 
farces  to  supply  the  Adelphi  for  the  season  ;  a  comedy  for  one 
of  the  great  theatres  just  ready  ;  a  whole  entertainment,  by 
himself,  for  Matthews  and  Yates  to  figure  in  ;  a  meditated 
Comic  Annual  for  next  year,  to  be  nearly  done  by  himself. 
You'd  like  him  very  much. 

"  Wordsworth,  I  see,  has  a  good  many  pieces  announced 
in  one  of  the  Annuals,  not  our  Gem.  W.  Scott  has  distributed 
himself  like  a  bribe  haunch  among  'em.  Of  all  the  poets, 
Carey  has  had  the  good  sense  to  keep  quite  clear  of  'em, 
with  gentle,  manly,  right  notions.  Don't  think  1  set  up  for 
being  proud  on  this  point ;  I  like  a  bit  of  flattery,  tickling  my 
vanity,  as  well  as  any  one.  But  these  pompous  masquerades 
without  masks  (naked  names  or  faces)  1  hate.  So  there's  a 
bit  of  my  mind.  Besides,  they  infallibly  cheat  you,  I  mean 
the  booksellers.  If  I  get  but  a  copy,  1  only  expect  it  from 
Hood's  being  my  friend.  Coleridge  has  lately  been  here. 
He  too  is  deep  among  the  prophets,  the  year  servers — the 
mob  of  gentlemen  annuals.  But  they'll  cheat  him,  I  know. 
And  now,  dear  B.  B.,  the  sun  shining  out  merrily,  and  the 
dirty  clouds  we  had  yesterday  having  washed  their  own  faces 
clean  with  their  own  rain,  tempts  me  to  wander  up  Winch- 
more  Hill,  or  into  some  of  the  delightful  vicinages  of  Enfield, 
which  I  hope  to  show  you  at  some  time  when  you  can  get  a 
few  days  up  to  the  great  town.  Believe  me  it  would  give 
both  of  us  great  pleasure  to  show  you  our  pleasant  farms  anJi 
villages. 

"  We  both  join  in  kindest  love  to  you  and  yours. 

"  C.  Lamb,  redivivusy 

The  following  is  of  December,  and  closes  the  letters  whic\ 
remain  of  this  year. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"Dec.  1828. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — 1  am  ashamed  to  receive  so  many  nice  books 

from  you,  and  to  have  none  to  send  you  in  return.     You  are 

always  sending  me  some  fruits  or  whoh'some   potherbs,  and 

mine  is  the  garden  of  the  Sluggard,  nothing  but  weeds,  or 

23* 


270  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

scarce  they.  Nevertheless,  if  1  knew  how  to  transmit  it,  I 
would  send  you  Blackwood's  of  this  month,  which  contains  a 
little  drama,  to  have  your  opinion  of  it,  and  how  far  1  have 
improved,  or  otherwise,  upon  its  prototype.  Thank  you  for 
your  kind  sonnet.  It  does  me  good  to  see  the  Dedication  to 
a  Christian  Bishop.  I  am  for  a  comprehension,  as  divines 
call  it  ;  but  so  as  that  the  Church  shall  go  a  good  deal  more 
than  half  way  over  to  the  silent  meeting-house.  I  have  ever 
said  that  the  Quakers  are  the  only  professors  of  Christianity, 
as  I  read  it  in  the  Evangiles  ;  I  say  professors — marry,  as  to 
practice,  with  their  gaudy  hot  types  and  poetical  vanities, 
they  are  much  as  one  with  the  sinful.  Martin's  frontispiece 
is  a  very  fine  thing,  let  C.  L.  say  what  he  please  to  the  con- 
trary. Of  the  poems,  I  like  them,  as  a  volume,  better  than 
any  of  the  preceding  ;  particularly  '  Power  and  Gentleness' — 
*  The  Present' — '  Lady  Russell ;'  with  the  exception  that  I  do 
not  like  the  noble  act  of  Curtius,  true  or  false — one  of  the  grand 
foundations  of  the  old  Roman  patriotism — to  be  sacrificed  to 
Lady  R.'s  taking  notes  on  her  husband's  trial.  If  a  thing  is 
good,  why  invidiously  bring  it  into  comparison  with  something 
belter  ?  There  are  too  few  heroic  things  in  this  world  to 
admit  of  our  marshalling  them  in  anxious  etiquettes  of  pre- 
cedence. Would  you  make  a  poem  on  the  story  of  Ruth 
(pretty  story  !)  and  then  say — Ay,  but  how  much  better  is 
the  story  of  '  Joseph  and  his  brethren  !'  To  go  on,  the 
stanzas  to  *  Chalon'  wants  the  name  of  Clarkson  in  the  body 
of  them  ;  it  is  left  to  inference.  The  '  Battle  of  Gibeon' 
is  spirited,  again.  '  Godiva'  is  delicately  touched.  I  have 
always  thought  it  a  beautiful  story,  characteristic  of  the  old 
English  times.  But  I  could  not  help  amusing  myself  with 
the  thought — if  Martin  had  chosen  this  subject  for  a  frontis- 
piece— there  would  have  been  in  some  dark  corner  a  white 
lady,  white  as  the  walker  on  the  waves,  riding  upon  some 
mystical  quadruped  ;  and  high  above  would  have  risen  tower 
above  tower — '  a  massy  structure  high' — the  Tenterden  stee- 
ples of  Coventry,  till  the  poor  cross  would  scarce  have  known 
itself  among  the  clouds  ;  and,  far  above  them  all,  the  distant 
Clint  hills  peering  over  chimney-pots,  piled  up,  Olympus 
fashion,  till  the  admiring  spectator  (admirer  of  a  noble  deed) 
might  have  gone  look  for  the  lady,  as  you  must  hunt  for  the 
other  in  the  lobster.  But  M should  be  made  royal  archi- 
tect. What  palaces  he  would  pile !  But,  then,  what  parlia- 
mentary grants  to  make  them  good  !  Nevertheless,  I  like  the 
frontispiece.  The  '  Elephant'  is  pleasant,  and  I  am  glad  you 
are  getting  into  a  wider  scope  of  subjects.  There  may  be  too 
much,  not  religion,  but  too  many  good  words  in  a  book,  till   t 


REMOVAL    TO    ENFIELD.  271 

becomes  a  rhapsody  of  words.  I  will  just  name  that  you 
have  brought  in  the  '  Song  to  the  Shepherds'  in  four  or  five, 
if  not  six  places.  Now  this  is  not  good  economy.  The 
'Enoch'  is  fine;  and  here  I  can  sacrifice  'Elijah'  to  it,  be- 
cause 'tis  illustrative  only,  and  not  disparaging  of  the  latter 
prophet's  departure.  1  like  this  best  in  the  book.  Lastly,  I 
much  like  the  '  Heron  ;'  'tis  exquisite.  Know  you  Lord  Thur- 
low's  Sonnet  to  a  bird  of  that  sort  on  Lacken  water  ?  If  not, 
'tis  indispensable  that  I  send  it  you,  with  my  Blackwood. 
'  Fludyer'  is  pleasant — you  are  getting  gay  and  Hood-ish. 
What  is  the  enigma  1     Money  ?     If  not,  I  fairly  confess  I  am 

foiled,  and  sphynx  must eat  me.      Four    times   I 

have  tried  to  write — eat  me,  and  the  blotting  pen  turns  it  into 
— cat  me.  And  now  I  will  take  my  leave  with  saying  I  es- 
teem thy  verses,  like  thy  present,  honour  thy  frontispiece, 
and  right  reverence  thy  patron  and  dedication,  and  am,  dear 
B.  B., 

"  Yours  heartily, 

"C.  Lamb." 


CHAPTER  XVn. 

[1829,  1830.] 

Letters  to  Robinson,  Procter,  Barton,  Wilson,  Gilman,  Wordsworth, 

and  Dyer. 

Having  decided  on  residing  entirely  at  Enfield,  Lamb  gave 
up  Colebrooke  cottage,  and  took  what  he  described  in  a  note- 
let  to  me  as  "  an  odd-looking  gambogish-coloured  house,"  at 
Chace-side,  Enfield.  The  situation  was  far  from  picturesque, 
for  the  opposite  side  of  the  road  only  presented  some  middling 
tenements,  two  dissenting  chapels,  and  a  public  house  deco- 
rated with  a  swinging  sign  of  a  Rising  Sun  ;  but  the  neigh- 
bouring field  walks  were  pleasant,  and  the  country,  as  he 
liked  to  say,  quite  as  good  as  Westmoreland. 

He  continued  occasional  contributions  to  the  New  Monthly, 
especially  the  series  of  "  Popular  Fallacies  ;"  wrote  short 
articles  in  the  Athenaeum  ;  and  a  great  many  acrostics  on  the 
names  of  his  friends.  He  had  now  a  neighbour  in  Mr.  Ser- 
geant Wilde,  to  whom  he  was  introduced  by  Mr.  Burney,  and 
whom  he  held  in  high  esteem,  though  Lamb  cared  nothing  for 
forensic  eloquence,  and  thought  very  little  of  eloquence  of  any 


272  LETTER    TO    ROBliNSON. 

kind,  which,  it  must  be  confessed,  when  printed,  is  the  most 
vapid  of  all  reading.  What  political  interest  could  not  excite, 
personal  regard  produced  in  favour  of  his  new  friend ;  and 
Lamb  supplied  several  versified  squibs  and  snatches  of  elec- 
tioneering songs  to  grace  Wilde's  contests  at  Newark.  With 
these  slender  avocations  his  life  was  dull,  and  only  a  sense 
of  duty  induced  him  to  persist  in  absence  from  London. 

The  following  letter  was  written  in  acknowledgment  of  a 
parcel  sent  to  Miss  Lamb,  comprising  (what  she  had  expressed 
a  wish  to  have)  a  copper  coal-scoop  and  a  pair  of  elastic  spec- 
tacles, accompanied  by  a  copy  of  "  Pamela,"  which,  having 
been  borrowed  and  supposed  to  be  lost,  had  been  replaced  by 
another  in  Lamb's  library. 

TO    MR.    H.    C.    ROBINSON. 

"  Dear  R. — Expectation  was  alert  on  the  receipt  of  your 
strange-shaped  present,  while  yet  undisclosed  from  its  fuse 
envelope.  Some  said  ^tis  a  viol  da  Gamba ;  others  pro- 
nounced it  a  fiddle  ;  I  myself  hoped  it  a  liqueur  case,  preg- 
nant with  eau-de-vie  and  such  old  nectar.  When  midwifed 
into  daylight,  the  gossips  were  at  a  loss  to  pronounce  upon  its 
species.  Most  took  it  for  a  marrow-spoon,  an  apple-scoop,  a 
banker's  guinea-shovel;  at  length  its  true  scope  appeared;  its 
drift,  to  save  the  back-bone  of  my  sister  stooping  to  scuttles. 
A  philanthropic  intent,  borrowed,  no  doubt,  from  some  of  the 
colliers.  You  save  people's  backs  one  way,  and  break  'em 
again  by  loads  of  obligation.  The  spectacles  are  delicate  and 
Vulcanian.  No  lighter  texture  than  their  steel  did  the  cuck- 
oldy  blacksmith  frame  to  catch  Mrs.  Vulcan  and  the  captain 
in.  For  ungalled  forehead,  as  for  back  unbursten,  you  have 
Mary's  thanks.  Marry,  for  my  own  peculium  of  obligation, 
'twas  supererogatory.  A  second  part  of  Pamela  was  enough 
in  conscience.  Two  Pamelas  in  a  house  is  too  much,  without 
two  Mr.  B.'s  to  reward  'em. 

"  Mary,  who  is  handselling  her  new  aerial  perspectives 
upon  a  pair  of  old  worsted  stockings  trod  out  in  Cheshunt 
lanes,  sends  her  love.  I,  great  good-liking.  Bid  us  a  per- 
sonal farewell  before  you  see  the  Vatican. 

"  Charles  Lamb. 

"  Enfield,  Feb.  27, 1829." 

The  following  letter  to  his  friend,  who  so  prosperously 
combines  conveyancing  with  poetry,  is  a  fair  sample  of  Lamb's 
elaborate  and  good-natured  fictions.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to 
say  that  the  reference  to  a  coolness  between  him  and  two  of 
his  legal  friends  is  part  of  the  fiction. 


LETTERS    TO    PROCTER.  273 


TO    MR.    PROCTER. 

"  My  dear  Procter — I  am  ashamed  not  to  have  taken  the 
drift  of  your  pleasant  letter,  which  I  find  to  have  been  pure 
invention.      But  jokes  are  not  suspected  in   BcBotian  Enfield. 
We  are  plain  people,  and  our  talk  is  of  corn,  and  cattle,  and 
Waltham  markets.     Besides,  I  was  a  little  out  of  sorts  when  1 
received  it.     The  fact  is,  I  am  involved  in  a  case  which  has 
fretted  me  to  death,  and  I  have  no  reliance  except  on  you  to 
extricate  me.     I  am  sure  you  will  give  me  your  best  legal  ad- 
vice, having  no  professional  friend   besides,  but  Robinson  and 
Talfourd,  with  neither  of  whom,  at  present,  I  am  on  the  best 
of  terms.     My  brothers  widow  left  a  will,  made  during  the 
lifetime  of  my  brother,  in  which  I  am  named  sole  executor,  bv 
which  she  bequeaths  forty  acres  of  arable  property,  which  it 
seems  she  held  under  covert  baron,  unknown  to  my  brother, 
to  the  heirs  of  the  body  of  Elizabeth   Dowden,  her  married 
daughter  by  a  first  husband,  in  fee  simple,  recoverable  by  fine  ; 
invested  property,  mind,  for  there  is  the  difficulty  ;   subjected 
to  leet  and  quit  rent;  in  short,  worded  in  the  most  guarded 
terms,  to  shut  out  the  property  from  Isaac  Dowden,  the   hus- 
band.    Intelligence  has  just  come  of  the  death  of  this  person 
in  India,  where  he  made  a  will,  entailing  this  property  (which 
seemed  entangled  enough  already)  to  the  heirs  of  his  body, 
that  should  not  be  born  of  his  wife  ;  for  it  seems,  by  the  law  in 
India,  natural  children  can  recover.     They  have  put  the  cause 
into  exchequer  process  here,  removed  by  certiorari  from   the 
native  courts  ;  and  the  question  is,  whether  I  should,  as  exec- 
utor, try  the  cause  here,  or  again  re-remove  it  to  the  Supreme 
Sessions  at  Bangalore^  which  I  understand  I  can,  or  plead  a 
hearing  before  the  privy  council  here.     As  it  involves  all  the 
little  property  of  Elizabeth  Dowden,  I  am  anxious  to  take  the 
fittest  steps,  and  what  may  be  least  expensive.     For  God's 
sake  assist  me,  for  the  case  is  so  embarrassed  that  it  deprives 
me  of  sleep  and  appetite.     M.  Burney  thinks  there  is   a  case 
like  it  in  chap.    170,  sec.  5,  in  '  Fearn's   Contingent  Remain- 
dors.'     Pray  read  it  over  witli  him  dispassionateiv,  and  \oi  mc 
have  the    result.      The    complexity  lies    in    the   quest ional)le 
power  of  the*  husband  to  alienate  in  usum  ;  enfeofTments  where- 
of he  was  only  collaterally  seised,  <fcc. 

"  I  had  another  favour  to  beg,  which  is  the  beggarliest  of 
beggings.  A  few  lines  of  verse  for  a  young  friend's  album 
(six  will  be  enough).  M.  Burney  will  tell  you  who  she  is  I 
want  'em  for.      A  girl  of  jjold.      Six  lines — make  'em  eight  — 

signed    Barry  C .     They  need   not  be  very  good,  as   1 

chiefly  want  'em  as  a  foil  to  mine,     l^it  I   shall  be  seriously 


274  LETTERS    TO    PROCTER. 

obliged  by  any  refuse  scrap.  We  are  in  the  last  ages  of  the 
world,  when  St.  Paul  prophesied  that  women  should  be  '  head- 
strong, lovers  of  their  own  wills,  having  albums.'  I  fled  hither 
to  escape  the  albumean  persecution  ;  and  had  not  been  in  my 
new  house  twenty-four  hours,  when  the  daughter  of  the  next 
house  came  in  with  a  friend's  album  to  beg  a  contribution,  and 
the  following  day  intimated  she  had  one  of  her  own.  Two 
more  have  sprung  up  since.  If  I  take  the  wings  of  the  morning 
and  fly  unto  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth,  there  will  albums 
be.  New  Holland  has  albums.  But  the  age  is  to  be  complied 
with.  M.  B.  will  tell  you  the  sort  of  girl  I  request  the  ten 
lines  for.  Somewhat  of  a  pensive  cast,  what  you  admire. 
The  lines  may  come  before  the  law  question,  as  that  cannot 
be  determined  before  Hilary  Term,  and  I  wish  your  deliberate 
judgment  on  that.  The  other  may  be  flimsy  and  superficial. 
And  if  you  have  not  burnt  your  returned  letter,  pray  resend  it 
me,  as  a  monumental  token  of  my  stupidity." 


Lamb  was  as  unfortunate  in  his  communications  with  the 
annuals  as  unhappy  in  the  importunities  of  the  fair  owners  of 
albums.  His  favourite  pieces  were  omitted  ;  and  a  piece  not 
his,  called  "  The  Widow,"  was,  by  a  license  of  friendship, 
which  Lamb  forgave,  inserted  in  one  of  them.  He  thus  com- 
plains of  these  grievances  in  a  letter  which  he  wrote  on  the 
marriage  of  the  daughter  of  a  friend  to  a  great  theoretical 
chymist. 

TO    MR.    PROCTER. 

"  Rumour   tells   us   that   Miss  is  married.     Who   is 

?   I  hear  he  is  a  great  chymist.     I  am  sometimes  chym- 


ical  myself.  A  thought  strikes  me  with  horror.  Pray  Heaven 
he  may  not  have  done  it  for  the  sake  of  trying  chymical  ex- 
periments upon  her — young  female  subjects  are  so  scarce. 
A  n't  you  glad  about  Burke's  case  ?  We  may  set  off"  the  Scotch 
murders  against  the  Scotch  novels.  Hare,  the  Great  Un 
haftged. 

"  M.  B.  is  richly  worth  your  knowing.  He  is  on  the  top 
scale  of  my  friendship  ladder,  on  which  an  angel  or  two  is 
still  climbing,  and  some,  alas  !  descending.  Did  you  see  a 
sonnet  of  mine  in  Blackwood's  last?  Curious  construction ! 
Elaborata  facilitas  !  And  now  I'll  tell.  'Twas  written  for 
*  The  Gem,'  but  the  editors  declined  it  on  the  plea  that  it 
would  shock  all  mothers;  so  they  published  'The  Widow'  in- 
stead. I  am  born  out  of  time.  I  have  no  conjecture  about  ( 
what  the  present  world  calls  delicacy.     I  thought  '  Rosamund  i 


i 


LETTERS    TO    PROCTER.  275 

Gray'  was  a  pretty  modest  thing.  Hessey  assures  me  that 
the  world  would  not  bear  it.  1  have  lived  to  grow  into  an 
indecent  character.  When  my  sonnet  was  rejected,  I  ex- 
claimed, '  Hang  the  age,  I  will  write  for  antiquity  !' 

"  Erratum  in  sonnet.  Last  line  but  something,  for  tender, 
read  tend.  The  Scotch  do  not  know  our  law  terms  ;  but  I 
find  some  remains  of  honest,  plain  old  writing  lurking  there 
still.  They  were  not  so  mealy-mouth'd  as  to  refuse  my  verses. 
Maybe  'tis  their  oatmeal. 

"  Blackwood  sent  me  — I.  for  the  drama.  Somebody  cheat- 
ed me  out  of  it  next  day  ;  and  my  new  pair  of  breeches,  just 
sent  home,  cracking  ai  first  putting  on,  I  exclaimed,  '  All 
tailors  are  cheats,  and  all  men  are  tailors.'  Then  I  was 
better." 

The  next  contains  Lamb's  thanks  for  the  verses  he  had 
begged  for  Miss  Isola's  album.  They  comprehended  a  com- 
pliment turning  on  the  words  Isola  Bella. 

TO    MR.    PROCTER. 

"  The  comings  in  of  an  incipient  conveyancer  are  not  ade- 
quate to  the  receipt  of  three  twopenny  post  non-paids  in  a 
week.  Therefore,  after  this,  I  condemn  my  pen  to  long  and 
deep  silence,  or  shall  awaken  it  to  write  to  lords.  Lest  those 
raptures  in  this  honeymoon  of  my  correspondence  you  avow 
for  the  visitations  of  my  Nuncio,  after  passing  through  certain 
natural  grades,  as  Love,  Love  and  Water,  Love  with  the  chill 
off,  then  subsiding  to  that  point  which  the  heroic  suiter  of  his 
wedded  dame,  the  noble-spirited  Lord  Randolph  in  the  play, 
declares  to  be  the  ambition  of  his  passion,  a  reciprocation  of 
'complacent  kindness,'  it  suddenly  plump  down  (scarce  stay- 
ing to  bait  at  the  mid  point  of  indifference,  so  hungry  it  is  for 
distaste)  to  a  loathing  and  blank  aversion,  to  the  rendering 
probable  such  counter  expressions  as  this,  '  Hang  that  infer- 
nal twopenny  postman  (words  which  make  the  messenger 
'lift  up  his  hands  and  wonder  who  can  use  them').  While, 
then,  you  are  not  ruined,  let  me  assure  thee,  oh  thou  above 
the  painter,  and  nexc  only  under  (liraldus  Cambrensis,  the 
most  immortal  and  worthy  to  be  immortal  Barry,  thy  most  in- 
genious and  golden  cadences  do  take  my  fancy  miirhtily. 
But  tell  me,  and  tell  me  truly,  gentle  swain,  is  that  Isola  Bel- 
la a  true  spot  in  geographical  denomination,  or  a  lloaling  De- 
los  in  ihy  brain.  Lurks  that  fair  island  in  verity  in  llie  bosom 
of  Lake  Maggiore,  or  some  other  with  less  poetic  name,  which 
thou  hast  Coniwallized  for  the  occasion.  And  what  if  Mag- 
giore itself  be  but  a  coinage  of  adaptation  ?     Of  this,  pray  re- 


276  LETTERS    TO    PKOCiER. 

solve  me  immediately,  for  my  albumess  will  be  catechised  on 
this  subject;  and  how  can  I  prompt  her?  Lake  Leman  I 
know,  and  Lemon  Lake  (in  a  punch  bowl)  I  have  swum  in, 
though  those  lymphs  be  long  since  dry.  But  Maggiore  may 
be  in  the  moon.  Unsphynx  this  riddle  for  me,  for  my  shelves 
have  no  gazetteer." 

The  following  letters  contain  a  noble  instance  of  Lamb's 
fine  consideration  and  exquisite  feeling  in  morality. 

TO    MR.    PROCTER. 

"  When  Miss was  at  Enfield,  which  she  was  in  sum- 
mer-time, and  owed  her  health  to  its  sun  and  genial  influ- 
ences, she  visited  (with  young  ladylike  impertinence)  a  poor 
man's  cottage  that  had  a  pretty  baby  (oh  the  yearnling  !),  gave 
it  fine  caps  and  sweetmeats.  On  a  day  broke  into  the  par- 
lour our  two  maids  uproarious,  '  Oh,  ma'am,  who  do  you  think 

Miss has  been  working  a  cap  for?'     'A  child,'  answered 

Mary,  in  true  Shandean  female  simplicity.     '  It's  the   man's 

child  as  was  taken  up  for  sheep-stealing.'     Miss was 

staggered,  and  would  have  cut  the  connexion,  but  by  main, 
force  I  made  her  go  and  take  her  leave  of  her  protegee.  1 
thought,  if  she  went  no  more,  the  Abactor  or  Abactor's  wife 
(vide  Ainsworth)  would  suppose  she  had  heard  something ; 
and  I  have  delicacy  for  a  sheep-stealer.  The  overseers  ac- 
tually overhauled  a  mutton-pie  at  the  baker's  (his  first,  last, 
and  only  hope  of  mutton-pie),  which  he  never  came  to  eat, 
and  thence  inferred  his  guilt.  Per  occasionem  cujus,  I  framed 
the  sonnet ;  observe  its  elaborate  construction.  I  was  four 
days  about  it. 

'THE  GIPSY'S  MALISON. 

"  Suck,  baby,  suck  !  mother's  love  grows  by  giving, 
Drain  the  sweet  founts  that  only  thrive  by  w^asting ; 
Black  manhood  comes,  when  riotous  guilty  living 

Hands  thee  the  cup  that  shall  be  death  in  tasting. 
Kiss,  baby,  kiss !  mother's  lips  shine  by  kisses, 

Choke  the  warm  breath  that  else  would  fall  in  blessings  ; 
Black  manhood  comes,  when  turbulent  guilty  bhsses 

Tend  thee  the  kiss  that  poisons  raid  caressings. 
Hang,  baby,  hang !  mother's  love  loves  such  forces. 

Strain  the  fond  neck  that  bends  still  to  thy  clinging; 
Black  manhood  comes,  when  violent  lawless  courses 
Leave  thee  a  spectacle  in  rude  air  swinging." 
So  sang  a  wither'd  beldam  energetical. 
And  bann'd  the  ungiving  door  with  lips  prophetical.' 

"  Barry,  study  that  sonnet.  It  is  curiously  and  perversely 
elaborate.  'Tis  a  choking  subject,  and  therefore  the  reader 
18  directed  to  the  structure  of  it.     See  you  ?  and  was  this  a 


LETTERS    TO    BARTOiV.  277 

fourteener  to  be  rejected    by  a    trumpery  annual  ?    forsooth, 

'twould  shock  all  mothers  ;  and  may  all  mothers,  who  would 

so  be  shocked,  be  hanged !  as  if  mothers  were  such  sort  of 

logicians  as  to  infer  the  future  hanging  of  their  child  from  the 

theoreiical   hangibility  (or  capacity  of  being  hanged,  if  the 

judge  pleases)  of  every  infant  born  with  a  neck  on.     Oh  B.  C, 

my  whole  heart  is  faint,  and  my  whole  head  is  sick  (how  is  it  ?) 

at  this  cursed,  canting,  unmasculine  age  !" 

****** 

There  is  a  little  Latin  letter  about  the  same  time  to  the 
same  friend. 

TO    MR.   PROCTER. 

"  Facundissime  Poeta !  quanquam  istiusmodi  epitheta  ora 
loribus  potius  quam  poetis  attinere  facile  scio — tamen,  facun- 
dissime ! 

"  Commoratur  nobiscum  janidiu,  in  agro  Enfeldiense,  scili- 
cet, leguleius  futurus,  illustrissimus  Martinus  Burneius,  otium 
agens,  negotia  nominalia,  et  officinam  clientum  vacuani,  pau- 
lulum  fugiens.  Orat,  implorat  te — nempe,  Martinus — ut  si 
(qu5d  Dii  faciant)  forte  fortuna,  absente  ipso,  advenerit  tardus 
cliens,  eum  certiorem  feceris  per  literas  hue  missas.  Intelli- 
gisne  ?  an  me  Anglice  et  barbarice  ad  te  hominem  perdoctum 
scribere  oportet  ?  C.  Agnus. 

"  Si  status  de  franco  tenemento  datur  avo,  et  in  eodem  fac- 
to si  mediate  vel  immediate  datur  hcsredibus  vcl  /xBredibus  cor- 
poris dicti  avi,  postrema  haec  verba  sunt  Limitationis  non  Per- 
quisitionis. 

"Dixi.  Carlagnulus." 

An  allusion  to  Rogers,  worthy  of  both,  occurs  in  a  letter 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  .lune  3,  1829. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — To  get  out  of  home  themes,  have  you  seen 
Southey's  'Dialogues?'  His  lake  descriptions,  and  the  ac- 
count of  his  library  at  Keswick,  are  very  fine.  But  he  need- 
ed not  have  called  up  the  ghost  of  More  to  hold  the  conversa- 
tions with,  which  might  as  well  have  passed  between  A.  and 
B.,or  Caius  and  Lucius.  It  i.s  making  too  free  with  a  defunct 
chancellor  and  martyr. 

•'  I  feel  as  if  I  had  nothing  further  to  write  about.     Oh !  I 
forgot;  the  prettiest  letter  1  ever  read,  tliat  I  have   received 
from  '  Pleasures  of  Memory'  Rogers,  in  acknow  lodgment  of  a 
sonnet  I  sent  him  on  the  loss  of  his  brother. 
24 


278  LETTERS    TO    BARTON. 

"  It  is  too  long  to  transcribe,  but  I  hope  to  show  it  you  some 

day,  as  I  hope  some  time  again  to  see  you  when  all  of  us  are 

well.     Only  it  ends  thus, '  We  were  nearly  of  an  age  (he  was 

the  elder)  ;  he  was  the  only  person  in  the  world  in  whose  eyes 

I  always  appeared  young.'  " 

****** 

What  a  lesson  does  the  following  read  to  us  from  one  who, 
while  condemned  to  uninteresting  industry,  thought  happiness 
consisted  in  an  affluence  of  time  ! 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  Enfield  Chace-side,  Saturday,  25th  July, 
A.  D.  1829,  11  A.  M. 

"  There — a  fuller,  plumper,  juicier  date  never  dropped  from 
Idumean  palm.  Am  I  in  the  date-ive  case  now  ?  if  not,  a  fig 
for  dates,  which  is  more  than  a  date  is  worth.  I  never  stood 
much  affected  to  those  limitary  specialities.  Least  of  all,  since 
the  date  of  my  superannuation. 

What  have  I  with  time  to  do  ? 
Slaves  of  desks,  'twas  meant  for  you. 

But  town,  with  all  my  native  hankering  after  it,  is  not  what  it 
was.  The  streets,  the  shops  are  left,  but  all  old  friends  are 
gone.  And  in  London  I  was  frightfully  convinced  of  this  as 
I  passed  houses  and  places,  empty  caskets  now.  I  have 
ceased  to  care  almost  about  anybody.  The  bodies  I  cared 
for  are  in  graves  or  dispersed.  My  old  chums,  that  lived  so 
long  and  flourished  so  steadily,  are  crumbled  away.  When 
I  took  leave  of  our  adopted  young  friend  at  Charing  Cross, 
'twas  a  heavy  unfeeling  rain,  and  I  had  nowhere  to  go.  Home 
have  I  none,  and  not  a  sympathizing  house  to  turn  to  in  the 
great  city.  Never  did  the  waters  of  heaven  pour  down  on  a 
forlorner  head.  Yet  I  tried  ten  days  at  a  sort  of  friend's  house, 
but  it  was  large  and  straggling — one  of  the  individuals  of  my 
old  long  knot  of  friends,  card-players,  pleasant  companions, 
that  have  tumbled  to  pieces,  into  dust  and  other  things ;  and  I 
got  home  on  Thursday,  convinced  that  it  was  better  to  get 
home  to  my  hole  at  Enfield,  and  hide  like  a  sick  cat  in  my 
corner.  And  to  make  me  more  alone,  our  ill-tempered  maid 
is  gone,  who,  with  all  her  airs,  was  yet  a  home -piece  of  fur- 
niture, a  record  of  better  days  ;  and  the  young  thing  that  has 
succeeded  her  is  good  and  attentive,  but  she  is  nothing.  And 
I  have  no  one  here  to  talk  over  old  matters  with.  Scolding 
and  quarrelling  have  something  o{ familiarity  and  a  community 
of  interest ;  they  imply  acquaintance  ;  they  are  of  one  sentiment, 
tvhich  is  of  the  family  of  dearness 

"  I  can  neither  scold  at  nor  quarrel  at  this  insignificant  im- 


LETTER    TO    WILSON.  279 

plement  of  household  services  ;  slie  is  less  than  a  cat,  and 
just  better  than  a  deal  dresser.  What  I  can  do,  and  over-do, 
is  to  walk  ;  but  deadly  long  are  the  days,  these  summer  all- 
day-days,  with  but  a  half  hour's  candlelight,  and  no  firelight. 
I  do  not  write,  tell  your  kind  inquisitive  Eliza,  and  can  hardly 
read.  'Tis  cold  work,  authorship,  without  something  to  puff 
one  into  fashion.  Could  you  not  write  something  on  Quaker- 
ism for  Quakers  to  read,  but  nominally  addressed  to  Non- 
Quakers,  explaining  your  dogmas,  as  waiting  on  the  Spirit, 
by  the  analogy  of  human  calmness,  and  waiting  on  the  judg- 
ment? I  scarcely  know  what  I  mean,  but  to  make  Non-Qua- 
kers reconciled  to  your  doctrines,  by  showing  something  like 
them  in  mere  human  operations  ;  but  I  hardly  understand  my- 
self, so  let  it  pass  for  nothing.  I  assure  you,  no  work  is  worse 
than  over  work.  The  mind  preys  on  itself,  the  most  unwhole- 
some food.  I  bragged  formerly  that  I  could  not  have  too  much 
time.  I  have  a  surfeit ;  with  few  years  to  come,  the  days 
are  wearisome.  But  weariness  is  not  eternal.  Something 
will  shine  out  to  take  the  load  off  that  crushes  me,  which  is 
at  present  intolerable.  I  have  killed  an  hour  or  two  in  this 
poor  scrawl.  I  am  a  sanguinary  murderer  of  time,  and  would 
'kill  him  inchmeal  just  now.  But  the  snake  is  vital.  Well, 
I  shall  write  merrier  anon.  'Tis  the  present  copy  of  my  coun- 
tenance I  send,  and  to  complain  is  a  little  to  alleviate.  May 
you  enjoy  yourself  as  far  as  the  wicked  world  will  let  you, 
and  think  that  you  are  not  quite  alone,  as  I  am  !  Health  to 
Lucia,  and  to  Anna,  and  kind  remembrances. 

"  Your  forlorn 

"  C.  L." 

The  cares  of  housekeeping  pressed  too  heavily  on  Miss 
Lamb,  and  her  brother  resolved  to  resign  the  dignity  of  a 
housekeeper  for  the  independence  of  a  lodger.  A  couple  of 
old  dwellers  in  Enfield,  hard  by  his  cottage,  had  the  good  for- 
tune to  receive  them.  Lamb  refers  to  the  change  in  the  fol- 
lowing letter,  acknowledging  the  receipt  of  Wilson's  '  Life  of 
De  Foe,'  in  which  a  criticism  from  his  pen  was  inserted,  im- 
bodying  the  sentiments  which  he  had  expressed  some  years 
before. 

TO    MR.    WALTER    WILSON. 

"  Enfiphl,  15tli  November,  1809. 

"  My  dear  Wilson — I  have  not  opened  a  pricket  of  unknown 

contents   for  many  years  that  gave   me   so  nnich  pleasure  as 

when  1  disclosed    your  three  volumes.      I  have  given  them  a 

careful  perusal,  and  they  liave  taken  their  degree  of  classical 


280  LETTER    TO    WILSON. 

books  upon  my  shelves.     De  Foe  was  always  my  darling, 
but  what  darkness  was  I  in  as  to  far  the  larger  part  of  his 
writings !     I  have  now  an  epitome  of  them  all.     I  tliink  the 
way  in  which  you  have  done  the  '  Life'  the  most  judicious  you 
could  have  pitched  upon.     You  have  made  him  tell  his  own 
story,  and  your  comments  are  in  keeping  with  the  tale.     Why, 
I  never  heard  of  such  a  work  as  '  the  Review.'     Strange  that, 
in  my  stall-hunting  days,  I  never  so  much  as  lit  upon  an  odd 
volume  of  it.     This  circumstance  looks  as  if  they  were  never 
of  any  great  circulation.     But  I  may  have  met  with  'em,  and, 
not   knowing    the  prize,   overpassed  'em.     I  was    almost    a 
stranger  to  the  whole  history  of  Dissenters  in  those  reigns, 
and  picked  my  way  through  that  strange  book,  the  '  Consoli- 
dator,'  at  random.     How  affecting  are  some  of  his  personal 
appeals  :   what  a  machine  of  projects  he  set  on  foot,  and  fol- 
lowing writers  have  picked  his  pocket  of  the  patents  !     I  do 
not  understand  whereabouts  in  Roxana  he  himself  left  off".     I 
always  thought  the  complete-tourist-sort  of  description  of  the 
town  she  passes  through  on  her  last  embarcation  miserably 
unseasonable  and  out  of  place.     I  knew  not  they  were  spuri- 
ous.    Enlighten  me  as  to  where  the  apocryphal  matter  com- 
mences.    I,  by  accident,  can  correct  one  A.  D.,  '  Family  In- 
structor,' vol.  ii.,  1718;  you  say  his  tirst  volume  had    then 
reached  the  fourth  edition  ;  now   I  have  a  fifth,  printed  for 
Eman  Matthews,  1717.     So  have  I  plucked  one  rotten  date, 
or  rather  picked  it  up  where  it  had  inadvertently  fallen,  from 
your  flourishing  date-tree,  the  Palm  of  Engaddi.     I  may  take 
It  for  my  pains.     1  think  yours  a  book  which  every  public  li- 
brary must  have,  and  every  English  scholar  should  have.     I 
am  sure  it  has  enriched  my  meager  stock  of  the  author's  works. 
I  seem  to  be  twice  as  opulent.     Mary  is  by  my  side,  just  fin- 
ishing the  second  volume.     It  must  have  interest  to  divert  her 
away  so  long  from  her  modern  novels.     Coleridge  will  be 
quite  jealous.     I  was  a  little  disappointed  at  my  '  Ode  to  the 
Treadmill'  not  finding  a  place,  but  it  came  out  of  time.     The 
two  papers  of  mine  will  puzzle  the  reader,  being  so    akin. 
Odd,  that,  never  keeping  a  scrap  of  my  own  letters,  with  some 
fifteen  years'  interval,  I  should    nearly  have  said  the  same 
things.     But  I  shall  always  feel  happy  in  having  my  name  go 
down  any  how  with  De  Foe's,  and  that  of  his  historiographer. 
I  promise  myself,  if  not  immortality,  yet  diuternity  of  being- 
read  in  consequence.     We  have  both  had  much  illness  this 
year,  and  feeling  infirmities  and  fretfulness  grow  upon  us  ; 
we  have  cast  off'  the  cares  of  housekeeping,  sold  off*  our  goods, 
and  commenced  boarding  and  lodging  with  a  very  comfortable 
old  couple  next  door  to  where  you  found  us.     We  use  a  sort 


LETTER    TO    OILMAN.  281 

of  common  lable.  Nevertheless,  we  have  reserved  a  private 
one  for  an  old  friend  ;  and  when  Mrs.  Wilson  and  you  revisit 
Babylon,  we  shall  pray  you  to  make  it  yours  for  a  season. 
Our  very  kindest  remembrances  to  you  both. 

"  From  your  old  friend  2in6.  fellow-journalist,  now  in  two  in- 
stances, 

♦'  C.  Lamb. 

"  Hazlitt  is  going  to  make  your  book  a  basis  for  a  review 
of  De  Foe's  Novels  in  '  the  Edinbro'.'  1  wish  I  had  health 
and  spirits  to  do  it.  Hone  I  have  not  seen,  but  I  doubt  not 
he  will  be  much  pleased  with  your  performance.  1  very 
much  hope  you  will  give  us  an  account  of  Dunton,  &c.  But 
what  I  should  more  like  to  see  would  be  a  life  and  times  of 
Bunyan.  Wishing  health  to  you,  and  long  life  to  your  healthy 
book,  again  I  subscribe  me, 

*'  Yours  in  verity, 

"  C.  L." 

About  the  same  time  the  following  letter  was  written,  al- 
luding to  the  same  change. 

TO    MR.    OILMAN. 

"  Dear  Gilman — Allsop  brought  me  your  kind  message 
yesterday.  How  can  I  account  for  not  having  visited  High- 
gate  this  long  time  ?  Change  of  place  seemed  to  have 
changed  me.  How  grieved  I  was  to  hear  in  what  indifferent 
health  Coleridge  has  been,  and  I  not  to  know  of  it !  A  little 
school  divinity,  well  applied,  may  be  healing.  I  send  him 
honest  Tom  of  Aquin  ;  that  was  always  an  obscure  great  idea 
to  me ;  1  never  thought  or  dreamed  to  see  him  in  the  flesh, 
but  t'other  day  I  rescued  him  from  a  stall  in  Barbican,  and 
brought  him  off  in  triumph.  He  comes  to  greet  Coleridge's 
acceptance,  for  his  shoe-latchets  I  am  unworthy  to  unloose. 
Yet  there  are  pretty  pro's  and  con's,  and  such  unsatisfactory 
learning  in  him.  Commend  me  to  the  question  of  etiquette — 
*  utrum  annunciatio  dchuer it  fieri  per  auircluni — Quast.  30,  Ar- 
ticulus  2.  I  protest,  till  now  1  had  thought  Gabriel  a  fellow  of 
some  mark  and  likelihood,  not  a  simple  esquire,  as  I  find  him. 
Well,  do  not  break  your  lay  brains,  nor  I  neither,  with  these 
curious  nothings,  'i'hey  are  nuts  to  our  dear  friend,  whom 
hoping  to  see  at  your  first  friendly  hint  that  it  will  be  conve- 
nient, I  end  with  begging  our  very  kindest  loves  to  Mrs.  Gil- 
man.  We  have  had  a  sorry  house  of  it  here.  Our  spirits 
have  been  reduced  till  we  were  at  hope's  end  what  to  do. 
Obliged  to  leave  this  house,  and  afraid  lo  engage  anodier,  till, 
in  extremity,  I  took  the  desperate  resolve  of  kicking  house  and 
24* 


282  LETTER    TO    BARTON. 

all  down,  like  Bunyan's  pack  ;  and  here  we  are  in  a  new  life 
at  board  and  lodging,  wiih  an  honest  couple  our  neighbours. 
We  have  ridded  ourselves  of  the  cares  of  dirty  acres  ;  and  the 
change,  though  of  less  than  a  week,  has  had  the  most  benefi- 
cial effects  on  Mary  already.  She  looks  two  years  and  a  half 
younger  for  it.     But  we  have  had  sore  trials. 

'•  God  send  us  one  happy  meeting  !     Yours  faithfully, 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  Chace-side,  Enfield,  26th  Oct.,  1829." 

The  first  result  of  the  experiment  was  happy,  as  it  brought 
improved  health  to  Miss  Lamb ;  to  which  Lamb  refers  in  the 
following  letter  to  his  Suffolk  friend,  who  had  announced  to 
him  his  appointment  as  assignee  under  a  bankruptcy. 

TO  BERNARD  BARTON. 

"  December  8th,  1829. 

"  My  dear  B.  B. — You  are  very  good  to  have  been  uneasy 
about  us,  and  I  have  the  satisfaction  to  tell  you  that  we  are 
both  in  better  health  and  spirits  than  we  have  been  for  a  year 
or  two  past.  The  cause  may  not  appear  quite  adequate 
when  1  tell  you  that  a  course  of  ill  health  and  spirits  brought 
us  to  the  determination  of  giving  up  our  house  here,  and  we 
are  boarding  and  lodging  with  a  worthy  couple,  long  inhabi- 
tants of  Enfield,  where  everything  is  done  for  us  without  our 
trouble,  further  than  a  reasonable  weekly  payment.  We 
should  have  done  so  before,  but  it  is  not  easy  to  flesh  and 
blood  to  give  up  an  ancient  establishment,  to  discard  old  Pe- 
nates, and  from  housekeepers  to  turn  housesharers.  (N.B. 
We  are  not  in  the  workhouse.)  Diocletian,  in  his  garden, 
found  more  repose  than  on  the  imperial  seat  of  Rome  ;  and 
the  nob  of  Charles  V.  ached  seldomer  under  a  monk's  cowl 
than  under  the  diadem.  With  such  shadows  of  assimilation 
we  countenance  our  degradation.  With  such  a  load  of  digni- 
fied cares  just  removed  from  our  shoulders,  we  can  the  more 
understand  and  pity  the  accession  to  yours,  by  the  advance- 
ment to  an  assigneeship.  I  will  tell  you  honestly,  B.  B.,  that 
it  has  been  my  long  deliberate  judgment  that  all  bankrupts,  of 
what  denomination,  civil  or  religious,  soever,  ought  to  be 
hanged.  The  pity  of  mankind  has  for  ages  run  in  a  wrong  di- 
rection, and  been  diverted  from  poor  creditors  (how  many  have 
1  known  sufferers  !  Hazlitt  has  just  been  defrauded  of  lOOZ. 
by  his  bookseller  friends  breaking)  to  scoundrel  debtors.  I 
know  all  the  topics — that  distress  may  overtake  an  honest  man 
without  his  fault  ;  that  the  failure  of  one  that  he  trusted  was 
his  calamity,  <fec.     Then  let  both  be  hanged.     Oh  how  careful 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  283 

this  would  make  traders  !  These  are  my  deliberate  thoughts, 
after  many  years'  experience  in  matters  of  trade.  *  *  Trade 
will  never  flourish  in  this  land  till  such  a  law  is  established. 
I  write  big,  not  to  save  ink,  but  eyes,  mine  having  been  troubled 
with  reading  through  three  folios  of  old  Fuller  in  almost  as 
few  days,  and  I  went  to  bed  last  night  in  agony,  and  am  wri- 
ting with  a  vial  of  eyewater  before  me,  alternately  dipping  in 
vial  and  inkstand.  This  may  inflame  my  zeal  against  bank- 
rupts, but  it  was  my  speculation  when  I  could  see  better. 
Half  the  world's  misery  (Eden  else)  is  owing  to  want  of 
money,  and  all  that  want  is  owing  to  bankrupts.  I  declare 
I  would,  if  the  state  wanted  practitioners,  turn  hangman  my- 
self, and  should  have  great  pleasure  in  hanging  the  first  after 
my  salutary  law  should  be  established.  I  have  seen  no  an- 
nuals, and  wish  to  see  none.  I  like  your  fun  upon  them,  and 
was  quite  pleased  with  Bowles's  sonnet.  Hood  is,  or  was,  at 
Brighton  ;  but  a  note  (prose  or  rhyme)  to  him,  Robert-street, 
Adelphi,  I  am  sure,  would  extract  a  copy  of  his^  which  also  I 
have  not  seen. 

"  Wishing  you  and  yours  all  health,  I  conclude  while  these 
frail  glasses  are,  to  me,  eyes. 

"C.  L." 

The  following  letter,  written  in  the  beginning  of  1830,  de- 
scribes his  landlord  and  landlady,  and  expresses,  with  a  fine 
solemnity,  the  feelings  which  still  held  him  at  Enfield. 

TO    MR.    WORDSWORTH. 

"  And  is  it  a  year  since  we  parted  from  you  at  the  steps  of 
Edmonton  stage  ?  There  are  not  now  the  years  that  there 
used  to  be.  The  tale  of  the  dwindled  age  of  men,  reported  of 
successional  mankind,  is  true  of  the  same  man  only.  AVe  do 
not  live  a  year  in  a  year  now.  'Tis  a  punctum  stans.  The 
seasons  pass  with  indifference.  Spring  cheers  not,  nor  winter 
heightens  our  gloom  ;  autumn  hath  foregone  its  moralities — 
they  are  '  hey-pass  re-pass,'  as  in  a  show-box.  Yet,  as  far 
as  last  year  recurs,  for  they  scarce  show  a  reflex  now,  they 
make  no  memory  as  heretofore,  'twas  sufficiently  gloomy. 
Lei  the  sullen  nothing  pass.  Suffice  it,  that  after  sad  sj)irits, 
prolonged  through  many  of  its  mouths,  as  it  called  them,  we 
have  cast  our  skins  ;  have  taken  a  farewell  of  the  pompous, 
troublesome  trifle  called  housekeeping,  and  are  settled  down 
into  poor  hoarders  and  lodgers  at  next  door  with  an  old  couple, 
the  Baucis  and  Baucida  of  dull  Enfield.  Mere  we  have  nothing: 
to  do  with  oHr  victuals  but  to  eat  th«un  ;  with  the  garden  but 
to  see  it  grow  ;  with  the  tax-gatherer  but  to  hear  him  knock  ; 


284  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

with  the  maid  but  to  hear  her  scolded.  Scot  and  lot,  butcher, 
baker,  are  things  unknown  to  us  save  as  spectators  of  the  pa- 
geant. We  are  fed  we  know  not  how ;  quietists,  confiding 
ravens.  We  have  the  otium  pro  dignitate,  a  respectable  in- 
significance. Yet  in  the  self-condemned  obliviousness,  in  the 
stagnation,  some  molesting  yearnings  of  life,  not  quite  killed, 
rise,  prompting  me  that  there  was  a  London,  and  that  1  was 
of  that  old  Jerusalem.  In  dreams  I  am  in  Fleet  Market, 
but  I  wake  and  cry  to  sleep  again.  1  die  hard,  a  stubborn 
Eloisa  in  this  detestable  paraclete.  What  have  I  gained  by 
health?  Intolerable  dulness.  What  by  early  hours  and 
moderate  meals?  A  total  blank.  Oh!  never  let  the  lying 
poets  be  believed  who  'tice  men  from  the  cheerful  haunts  of 
streets,  or  think  they  mean  it  not  of  a  country  village.  In  the 
ruins  of  Palmyra  I  would  gird  myself  up  to  solitude,  or  muse 
to  the  snoring  of  the  Seven  Sleepers  ;  but  to  have  a  little 
teazing  image  of  a  town  about  one  ;  country  folks  that  do  not 
look  like  country  folks  ;  shops  two  yards  square,  half  a  dozen 
apples,  and  two  penn'orth  of  overlooked  gingerbread  for  the 
lofty  fruiterers  of  Oxford-street;  and,  for  the  immortal  book 
and  print  stalls,  a  circulating  library  that  stands  still,  where 
the  show-picture  is  a  last  year's  Valentine,  and  whither  the 
fame  of  the  last  ten  Scotch  novels  has  not  yet  travelled 
(marry,  they  just  begin  to  be  conscious  of  Red-gauntlet) ;  to 
have  a  new  plastered  flat  church,  and  to  be  wishing  that  it 
was  but  a  cathedral !  The  very  blackguards  here  are  degen- 
erate ;  the  topping  gentry  stock-brokers  ;  the  passengers  too 
many  to  ensure  your  quiet,  or  let  you  go  about  whistling  or 
gaping,  too  few  to  be  the  fine  indiflferent  pageants  of  Fleet- 
street.  Confining,  room-keeping,  thickest  winter,  is  yet  more 
bearable  here  than  the  gaudy  months.  Among  one's  books  at 
one's  fire  by  candle,  one  is  soothed  into  an  oblivion  that  one 
is  not  in  the  country ;  but  with  the  light  the  green  fields  re- 
turn, till  I  gaze,  and  in  a  calenture  can  plunge  myself  into  St. 
Giles's.  Oh !  let  no  native  Londoner  imagine  that  health, 
and  rest,  and  innocent  occupation,  interchange  of  converse 
sweet,  and  recreative  study,  can  make  the  country  anything 
better  than  altogether  odious  and  detestable.  A  garden  was  the 
primitive  prison,  till  man,  with  Promethean  felicity  and  bold- 
ness, luckily  sinned  himself  out  of  it.  Thence  followed  Bab- 
ylon, Nineveh,  Venice,  London,  haberdashers,  goldsmiths, 
taverns,  playhouses,  satires,  epigrams,  puns — these  all  came 
in  on  the  town  part,  and  the  thither  side  of  innocence.  Man 
found  out  inventions.  From  my  den  I  return  you  condolence 
for  your  decaying  sight ;  not  for  anything  there  is  to  see  in 
the  country,  hut  for  the  miss  of  the  pleasure  of  reading  a  liOn- 


LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH.  285 

don  newspaper.  The  poets  are  as  well  to  listen  to  ;  anything 
high  may,  nay,  must,  be  read  out ;  you  read  it  to  yourself  with 
an  imaginary  auditor;  but  the  light  paragraphs  must  be  glid 
over  by  the  proper  eye  ;  mouthing  mumbles  their  gossamery 
substance.  'Tis  these  trifles  I  should  mourn  in  fading  sight. 
A  newspaper  is  the  single  gleam  of  comfort  I  receive  here  ;  it 
comes  from  rich  Cathay  with  tidings  of  mankind.  Yet  I  could 
not  attend  to  it,  read  out  by  the  most  beloved  voice.  But  your 
eyes  do  not  get  worse,  1  gather.  Oh  for  the  collyrium  of  To- 
bias enclosed  in  a  whiting's  liver,  to  send  you  with  no  apoc- 
ryphal good  wishes  !  The  last  long  time  I  heard  from  you 
you  had  knocked  your  head  against  something.  Do  not  do  so  ; 
for  your  head  (I  do  not  flatter)  is  not  a  nob,  or  the  top  of  a 
brass  nail,  or  the  end  of  a  ninepin — unless  a  Vulcanian  ham- 
mer could  fairly  batter  a  '  Recluse'  out  of  it ;  then  would  I  bid 
the  smirched  god  knock  and  knock  lustily,  the  two-handed 
skiiiker.  Mary  must  squeeze  out  a  line  proprid  manu ;  but, 
indeed,  her  fingers  have  been  incorrigibly  nervous  to  letter- 
writing  for  a  long  interval.  'Twill  please  you  all  to  hear, 
that  though  I  fret  like  a  lion  in  a  net,  her  present  health  and 
spirits  are  better  than  they  have  been  for  some  time  past ; 
she  is  absolutely  three  years  and  a  half  younger,  as  I  tell  her, 
since  we  have  adopted  this  boarding  plan. 

"  Our  providers  are  an  honest  pair.  Dame  W and  her 

husband  ;  he,  \'vhen  the  light  of  prosperity  shined  on  them,  a 
moderately  thriving  haberdasher  within  Bow  bells,  retired 
since  with  something  under  a  competence  ;  writes  himself 
gentleman  ;  hath  borne  parish  offices  ;  sings  fine  old  sea  songs 
at  threescore  and  ten  ;  sighs  only  now  and  then  when  he 
thinks  that  he  has  a  son  on  his  hands  about  fifteen,  whom  he 
finds  a  difficulty  in  getting  out  into  the  world,  and  then  checks 
a  sigh  with  muttering,  as  I  once  heard  him  prettily,  not  mean- 
ing to  be  heard,  '  I  have  married  my  daughter,  however ;' 
takes  the  weather  as  it  comes  ;  outsides  it  to  town  in  severest 
season  ;  and  o'  winter  nights  tells  old  stories  not  tending  to 
literature  (how  comfortable  to  author-rid  folks  !)  and  has  one 
anf:C(lotP,  upon  which  and  about  forty  pounds  a  year  he  seems 
to  have  retired  in  green  old  age.  It  was  how  he  was  a  rider 
in  his  youth,  travelling  for  shops,  and  once  (not  to  balk  his 
employer's  bargain),  on  a  sweltering  day  in  August,  rode  foam- 
ing into  Dunstable  upon  a  mad  horse,  to  the  dismay  and  ex- 
posiulatory  wonderment  of  innkeepers,  ostlers,  Aic,  who  de- 
clared they  would  not  have  bestrid  the  beast  to  win  the  Derby. 
Understand,  the  creature  galled  to  death  and  desperation  by 
gadflies,  cormorant-winged,  worse  than  lieset  Inachus's  daugh- 
ter.    This  he  tells,  this  he  brindles  and  burnishes  on  a  win- 


286  LETTER    TO    WORDSWORTH. 

ter's  eve  ;  'tis  his  star  of  set  glory,  his  rejuveniscence,  to  de- 
scant upon.  Far  from  me  be  it  [dii  avertant)  to  look  a  gift 
story  in  the  mouth,  or  cruelly  to  surmise  (as  those  who  doubt 

.he  plunge  of  Curtius)  that  the  inseparate  conjuncture  of  man 
and  beast,  the  centaur-phenomenon  that  staggered  all  Dunsta- 
ble, might  have  been  the  effect  of  unromantic  necessity  ;  that 
the  horsepart  carried  the  reasoning,  willy  nilly  ;  that  needs 
must  when  such  a  devil  drove  ;  that  certain  spiral  configura- 
tions in  the  frame  of  T W ,  unfriendly  to  alighting, 

made  the  alliance  more  forcible  than  voluntary.  Let  him 
enjoy  his  fame  for  me,  nor  let  me  hint  a  whisper  that  shall 
dismount  Bellerophon.  But  in  case  he  was  an  involuntary 
martyr,  yet  if  in  the  fiery  conflict  he  buckled  the  soul  of  a  con- 
stant haberdasher  to  him,  and  adopted  his  flames,  let  accident 

and  he  share  the  glory.     You  would  all  like  T W . 

*[  ]      How  weak  is  painting  to  describe  a  man !     Say 

that  he  stands  four  feet  and  a  nail  high  by  his  own  yard  meas- 
ure, which,  like  the  sceptre  of  Agamemnon,  shall  never  sprout 
again,  still  you  have  no  adequate  idea ;  nor  when  I  tell  you 
that  his  dear  hump,  which  I  have  favoured  in  the  picture, 
seems  to  me  of  the  buflalo — indicative  and  repository  of  mild 
qualities,  a  budget  of  kindnesses — still  you  have  not  the  man. 
Knew  you  old  Norris  of  the  Temple  ?  sixty  years  ours  and  our 
fathers'  friend  ?  He  was  not  more  natural  to  us  than  this  old 
W.,  the  acquaintance  of  scarce  more  weeks.  Under  his  roof 
now  ought  I  to  take  my  rest,  but  that  back-looking  ambition 
tells  me  I  might  yet  be  a  Londoner !  Well,  if  we  ever  do 
move,  we  have  encumbrances  the  less  to  impede  us  ;  all  our 
furniture  has  faded  under  the  auctioneer's  hammer,  going  for 
nothing  like  the  tarnished  frippery  of  the  prodigal,  and  we 
have  only  a  spoon  or  two  left  to  bless  us.  Clothed  we  came 
into  Enfield,  and  naked  we  must  go  out  of  it.  I  would  live 
in  London  shirtless,  bookless.  Henry  Crabb  is  at  Rome ; 
advices  to  that  eflfect  have  reached  Bury.  But  by  solemn 
legacy  he  bequeathed  at  parting  (whether  he  should  live  or 
die)  a  turkey  of  Suffolk  to  be  sent  every  succeeding  Christ- 
mas to  us  and  divers  other  friends.  What  a  genuine  old  bach- 
elor's action !  I  fear  he  will  find  the  air  of  Italy  too  classic. 
His  station  is  in  the  Harz  forest;  his  soul  is  be-Goethed. 
Miss  Kelly  we  never  see  ;  Talfourd  not  this  half  year ;  the 
latter  flourishes,  but  the  exact  number  of  his  children,  God 
forgive  me,  I  have  utterly  forgotten  ;  we  single  people  are 
often  out  in  our  count  there.  Shall  I  say  two  ?  We  see 
scarce  anybody.  Can  I  cram  loves  enough  to  you  all  m  this 
little  O  '(     Excuse  particularizing.  C.  L." 

*  Here  was  a  rude  sketch  of  a  gentleman  answering  to  the  description. 


LETTERS    TO    OILMAN.  287 

A  letter  which,  addressed  to  Mr.  Gilman,  was  intended  both 
for  him  and  his  great  guest  Coleridge,  gives  another  version  of 

the  same   character.     "  One   anecdote"  of  T W is 

repeated  in  it,  with  the  substitution  of  Devizes  for  Dunstable. 
Which  is  the  veritable  place  must  remain  a  curious  question 
for  future  descant,  as  the  hero  is  dead,  and  his  anecdote  sur- 
vives alone  in  these  pages.  It  seems  that  Miss  Lamb  had 
accompanied  his  landlord  on  a  little  excursion. 

TO    MH.   GILMAN. 

"  Dear  G. — The  excursionists  reached  home  and  the  good 
town  of  Enfield  a  little  after  four,  without  slip  or  dislocation. 
Little  has  transpired  concerning  the  events  of  the  back  jour- 
ney, save  that  of  passing  the  house  of  Squire  MelUsh,  situate 

a  stone  bow's  cast  from  the  hamlet.     Father  W ,  with  a 

good-natured  wonderment,  exclaimed,  '  I  cannot  think  what  is 
gone  of  Mr.  Mellish's  rooks.  1  fancy  they  have  taken  flight 
somewhere,  but  I  have  missed  them  two  or  three  years  past.' 
All  this  while,  according  to  his  fellow-traveller's  report,  the 
rookery  was  darkening  the  air  above  with  undiminished  popu- 
lation, and  deafening  all  ears  but  his  with  their  cawings.  But 
nature  has  been  gently  withdrawing  such  phenomena  t'rom  the 

notice  of  two  of  T W 's   senses,  from   the   time  lie 

began  to  miss  the  rooks.     T.  W has  passed  a  retired  life 

in  this  hamlet  of  thirty  or  forty  years,  living  upon  the  mininunn 
which  is  consistent  with  gentility,  yet  a  star  among  the  minor 
gentry,  receiving  the  bows  of  the  tradespeople  and  courtesies 
of  the  almswomen  daily.  Children  venerate  him  not  less 
for  his  external  show  of  gentry  than  they  wonder  at  him  for 
a  gentle  rising  endorsation  of  the  person,  not  amounting  to  a 
hump,  or  if  a  hump,  innocuous  as  the  hump  of  the  buffalo,  and 
coronative  of  as  mild  qualities.  'Tis  a  throne  on  which  pa- 
tience seems  to  sit — the  proud  perch  of  a  self-respecting  hu- 
mility, stooping  with  condescension.  Thereupon  the  cares  of 
life  have  sat,  and  rid  him  easily.  For  he  has  ihrid  the  an- 
gusti(B  domiis  with  dexterity.  Life  opened  upon  him  with 
comparative  brilliancy.  He  set  out  a  rider  or  traveller  for  a 
wholesale  house,  in  which  capacity  he  tells  of  many  hair- 
breadth escapes  that  befell  him  ;  oue  especially,  how  he  rode 
a  mad  horse  into  the  town  of  Devizes  ;  how  horse  and  rider 
arrived  in  a  foam,  to  the  utter  consternation  of  the  e.xpostu- 
lating  hostlers,  innkeepers,  &,c.  It  seems  it  was  sultry  weather, 
piping  hot  ;  the  steed  tormented  into  phrensy  with  gadflies, 
long  past  being  roadworthy  ;  but  safety  and  the  interest  of  the 
house  he  rode  for  were  incompatible  things  ;  a  fall  in  serge 
cloth   was    expected,  and   a    mad  entrance   they  made  of  it. 


28S  LETTERS    TO    OILMAN. 

Whether  the  exploit  was  purely  voluntary,  or  partially ;  or 
whether  a  certain  personal  disfiguration  in  the  man-part  of  this 
extraordinary  centaur  (nonassistive  to  partition  of  natures) 
might  not  enforce  the  conjunction,  I  stand  not  to  inquire.  I 
look  not  with  'skew  eyes  into  the  deeds  of  heroes.  The  ho- 
sier that  was  burnt  with  his  shop  in  Field-lane,  on  Tuesday 
night,  shall  have  passed  to  heaven  for  me  like  a  Marian  mar- 
tyr, provided  always  that  he  consecrated  the  fortuitous  incre- 
mation with  a  short  ejaculation  in  the  exit,  as  much  as  if  he 
had  taken  his  state  degrees  of  martyrdom  informd  in  the  market 
vicinage.  There  is  adoptive  as  well  as  acquisitive  sacrifice. 
Be  the  animus  what  it  might,  the  fact  is  indisputable,  that  this 
composition  was  seen  flying  all  abroad,  and  mine  host  of 
Damtry  may  yet  remember  its  passing  through  his  town,  if 
his  scores  are  not  more  faithful  than  his  memory.     After  this 

exploit  (enough  for  one  man),  T W seems  to  have 

subsided  into  a  less  hazardous  occupation  ;  and  in  the  twenty- 
fifih  year  of  his  age  we  find  him  a  haberdasher  in  Bow-lane  ; 
yet  still  retentive  of  his  early  riding  (though  leaving  it  to 
rawer  stomachs),  and  Christmasly  at  night  sithence  to  this 
last,  and  to  his  latest  Christmas,  hath  he,  doth  he,  and  shall 
he,  tell  after  supper  the  story  of  the  insane  steed  and  the  des- 
perate rider.  Save  for  Bedlam  or  Luke's,  no  eye  could  have 
guessed  that  melting  day  what  house  he  rid  for.  But  he  re- 
poses on  his  bridles,  and  after  the  ups  and  downs  (metaphoric 
only)  of  a  life  behind  the  counter — hard  riding  sometimes,  I 
fear,  for  poor  T.  W. — with  the  scrapings  together  of  the  shop, 
and  one  anecdote^  he  hath  finally  settled  at  Enfield  ;  by  hard 
economizing,  gardening,  building  for  himself,  hath  reared  a 
mansion ;  married  a  daughter ;  qualified  a  son  for  a  counting- 
house  ;  gotten  the  respect  of  high  and  low  ;  served  for  self  or 
substitute  the  greater  parish  offices ;  hath  a  special  voice  at 
vestries  ;  and,  domiciliating  us,  hath  reflected  a  portion  of  his 
housekeeping  respectability  upon  your  humble  servants.  We 
are  greater,  being  his  lodgers,  than  when  we  were  substantial 
renters.  His  name  is  a  passport  to  take  off  the  sneers  of  the 
native  Enfielders  against  obnoxious  foreigners.  We  are  en- 
denizened.    Thus  much  of  T.  W have  I  thought  fit  to 

acquaint  you,  that  you  may  see  the  exemplary  reliance  upon 
Providence  with  which  I  intrusted  so  dear  a  charge  as  my  own 
sister  to  the  guidance  of  the  man  that  rode  the  mad  horse  into 
Devizes.  To  come  from  his  heroic  character,  all  the  amiable 
qualities  of  domestic  life  concentre  in  this  tamed  Bellerophon. 
He  is  excellent  over  a  glass  of  grog";  just  as  pleasant  without 
it ;  laughs  when  he  hears  a  joke  and  when  (which  is  much 
oftener)  he  hears  it  not ;  sings  glorious  old  sea  songs  on  fes- 


LETTERS    TO    OILMAN.  289 

lival  nights  ;  and  but  upon  a  slight  acquaintance  of  two  years, 
Coleridge  is  as  dear  a  deaf  old  man  to  us  as  old  Norris,  rest 
his  soul  !  was  after  fifty.  To  him  and  his  scanty  literature 
(what  there  is  of  it,  sound)  have  we  flown  from  the  metropolis 
and  its  cursed  annualists,  reviewers,  authors,  and  the  whole 
muddy  ink  press  of  that  stagnant  pool. 

"  Now,  Gilman  again,  you  do  not  know  the  treasures  of  the 
Fullers.  1  calculate  on  having  massy  reading  till  Christmas. 
All  I  want  here  is  books  of  the  true  sort,  not  those  things  in 
boards  that  moderns  mistake  for  books,  what  they  club  for  at 
book-clubs. 

"  I  did  not  mean  to  cheat  you  with  a  blank  side,  but  my 
eye  smarts,  for  which  I  am  taking  medicine,  and  abstain,  this 
day  at  least,  from  any  aliments  but  milk  porridge,  the  innocent 
taste  of  which  I  am  anxious  to  renew  after  a  half  century's 
disacquaintance.  If  a  blot  fall  here  like  a  tear,  it  is  not  pathos, 
but  an  angry  eye. 

"  Farewell,  while  my  specilla  are  sound. 

"  Yours,  and  yours, 

"  C.  Lamb." 

The  next  letter  to  Coleridge's  excellent  host  is  a  reply  to 
a  request  from  an  importunate  friend  of  his  correspondent, 
that  he  would  write  something  on  behalf  of  the  SpitalHelds' 
weavers.  Alien  as  such  a  task  would  have  been  to  his  habits 
of  thought  or  composition,  if  Lamb  had  been  acquainted  with 
that  singular  race,  living  in  their  high,  narrow,  overpeopled 
houses,  in  the  thickest  part  of  London,  yet  almost  apart  from 
the  great  throng  of  its  dwellers ;  indulging  their  straitened 
sympathies  in  the  fostering  of  the  more  tender  animals,  as 
rabbits  and  pigeons,  nurtured  in  their  garrets  or  cellars  ;  or 
cultivating  some  stunted  plants  with  an  intuitive  love  of  na- 
ture, unfed  by  any  knowledge  of  verdure  beyond  Hoxton  ; 
their  painful  industry,  their  uneducated  morals,  their  eager 
snatches  of  pleasure  from  the  only  quickening  of  their  intel- 
lect, by  liquors,  which  make  glad  the  heart  of  man  ;  he  would 
scarcely  have  refused  the  offered  retainer  for  them. 

TO    MR.    OILMAN. 

"  My  dear  G. — Your  friend  \\ (for  I  know  him  imme 

diafely  by  the  smooth  satinity  of  his  style)  must  excuse  me 
for  advocating  the  cause  of  his  friends  in  Spitalfields.  The 
fact  is,  I  am  retained  by  the  Norwich  people,  and  have  al- 
ready appeared  in  their  paper  under  the  signatures  of  '  Lu- 
cius Sergius,'' Bluff,'  '  Broadcloth,'  'No-Trade-to-the-Woollen- 
Trade,'  'Anti-Plush,'   <fcc.,  in  defence  of  druggets  and  long 

Vol-  L— 25  N 


290  LETTERS    TO    GILMAN. 

camlets.  And  without  this  pre-engagement,  I  feel  I  should 
naturally  have  chosen  a  side  opposite  to ,  for  in  the  silk- 
en seemingness  of  his  nature  there  is  that  which  offends  me. 
My  flesh  tingles  at  such  caterpillars.  He  shall  not  crawl  me 
over.     Let  him  and  his  workmen  sing  the  old  burden, 

'  Heighho,  ye  weavers  !' 

for  any  aid  I  shall  offer  them  in  this  emergency.  I  was  over 
Saint  Luke's  the  other  day  with  my  friend  Tuihill,  and  might- 
ily pleased  with  one  of  his  contrivances  for  the  comfort  and 
amelioration  of  the  students.  They  have  double  cells,  in 
which  a  pair  may  lie  feet  to  feet  horizontally,  and  chat  the 
time  away  as  rationally  as  they  can.  It  must  certainly  be 
more  sociable  for  them  these  warm  raving  nights.  The  right- 
hand  truckle  in  one  of  these  friendly  recesses,  at  present  va- 
cant, was  preparing,  I  understood,  for  Mr.  Irving.  Poor  fel- 
low !  it  is  time  he  removed  from  Pentonville.  1  followed  him 
as  far  as  to  Highbury  the  other  day,  with  a  mob  at  his  heels, 
calling  out  upon  Ermigiddon,  who,  I  suppose,  is  some  Scotch 
moderator.  He  squinted  out  his  favourite  eye  last  Friday,  in 
the  fury  of  possession,  upon  a  poor  woman's  shoulders  that 
was  crying  matches,  and  has  not  missed  it.  The  companion 
truck,  as  far  as  I  could  measure  it  with  my  eye,  would  con- 
veniently fit  a  person  about  the  length  of  Coleridge,  allowing  for 
a  reasonable  drawing  up  of  the  feet,  not  at  all  painful.  Does 
he  talk  of  moving  this  quarter  ?  You  and  I  have  too  much 
sense  to  trouble  ourselves  with  revelations  ;  marry,  to  the 
same  in  Greek,  you  may  have  something  professionally  to 
say.  Tell  C.  that  he  was  to  come  and  see  us  some  fine  day. 
Let  it  be  before  he  moves,  for  in  his  new  quarters  he  will 
necessarily  be  confined  in  his  conversation  to  his  brother 
prophet.  Conceive  the  two  rabbis  foot  to  foot,  for  there  are  no 
Gamaliels  there  to  affect  a  humbler  posture  !  All  are  masters 
in  that  Patmos,  where  the  law  is  perfect  equality ;  Latmos,  I  | 
should  rather  say,  for  they  will  be  Luna's  twin  darlings ;  her 
affection  will  be  ever  at  the  full.  Well,  keep  your  brains 
moist  with  gooseberry  this  mad  March,  for  the  devil  of  expo- 
sition seeketh  dry  places. 

"  C.  L." 

Here  is  a  brief  reply  to  the  questioning  of  Lamb's  true- 
hearted  correspondent.  Barton,  who  doubted  of  the  personal 
verity  of  Lamb's  "Joseph  Paice,"  the  most  po'ite  of  the  old 
Templars.  This  friend's  personal  acquaintance  with  Lamb 
had  not  been  frequent  enough  to  teach  him,  that  if  Lamb 
could  innocently  "  lie  like  truth,"  he  made  up  for  this  free- 


LETTER    TO    DYER.  291 

dom  by  sometimes  making  truth  look  like  a  lie.  His  account 
of  Mr.  Paice's  politeness  could  be  attested  to  the  letter  by  liv- 
ing witnesses. 

TO    BERNARD    BARTON. 

"  Dear  B.  B. — To  reply  to  you  by  return  of  post,  I  must  gob- 
ble up  my  dinner,  and  despatch  this  in  propria  persond  to  the 
office  to  be  in  time.  So  take  it  from  me  hastily,  that  you  are 
perfectly  welcome  to  furnish  A.  C.  with  the  scrap,  which  I 
had  almost  forgotten  writing.  The  more  my  character  comes 
to  be  known,  the  less  my  veracity  will  come  to  be  suspected. 
Time  every  day  clears  up  some  suspected  narrative  of  Herod- 
otus, Bruce,  and  others  of  us  great  travellers.  Why,  that  Jo- 
seph Paice  was  as  real  a  person  as  Joseph  Hume,  and  a  great 
deal  pleasanter.  A  careful  observer  of  life,  Bernard,  has  no 
need  to  invent.  Nature  romances  it  for  him.  Dinner-plates 
rattle,  and  I  positively  shall  incur  indigestion  by  carrying  ii 
half  concocted  to  the  posthouse.  Let  me  congratulate  you  on 
the  spring  coming  in,  and  do  you,  in  return,  condole  with  me  on 
the  winter  going  out.  When  the  old  one  goes,  seldom  comes 
a  better.  1  dread  the  prospect  of  summer,  with  his  all  day- 
long days.  No  need  of  his  assistance  to  make  country-places 
dull.  With  fire  and  candlelight,  I  can  dream  myself  in  Hol- 
born  ;  with  lightsome  skies  shining  in  to  bedtime,  I  cannot. 
This  is  Meschek,  and  these  are  the  tents  of  Kedar.  1  would 
dwell  in  the  skirls  of  Jericho  rather,  and  think  every  blast  of 
the  coming  in  mail  a  ram's-horn.  Give  me  old  London  at  fire 
and  plague  time,  rather  than  these  tepid  gales,  healthy  coun- 
try airs,  and  purposeless  exercise. 

"  Leg  of  mutton  absolutely  on  the  table. 

*'  Take  our  hasty  loves  and  a  short  farewell. 

"  C.  L." 

A  rural  conflagration  at  this  time  kindled  the  noblest  range 
of  Lamb's  thoughts,  which  he  expressed  in  the  following  let- 
ter. 'I'he  light  he  flashes  on  the  strange  power  exerted  by  the 
half-wilted  incendiary  shows  in  it  something  of  a  fearful  gran- 
deur.     It  is  addressed 

TO    MR.    DYER. 

"  Dear  Dyer — I  should  have  written  before  to  thank  you  for 
your  kind  letter,  written  with  your  own  hand.  It  glads  me  to 
see  your  writing.  It  will  give  you  pleasure  to  hear  ihaf,  after 
so  much  illness,  we  are  in  tolerable  hcalih  and  spirits  once 
more.  Poor  Enfield,  that  has  been  so  peaceful  hitherto,  has 
caught  the  inflammatory  fever  ;  the  tokens  are  upon  her  ;  and  a 

N  2 


292  LETTER    TO    DYER. 

great  fire  was  blazing  last  night  in  the  barns  and  haystacks  of  a 
farmer  about  half  a  niile  from  us.   Where  will  these  things  end  ? 
There  is  no  doubt  of  its  being  the  work  of  some  ill-disposed 
rustic,  but  how  is  he  to  be  discovered  ?     They  go  to  work  in 
the  dark  with  strange  chymical  preparations,  unknown  to  our 
forefathers.     There  is  not  even   a  dark   lantern,   to   have   a 
chance  of  detecting  these  Guy  Fauxes.     We  are  past  the  iron 
age,  and  are  got  into  the  fiery  age,  undreamed  of  by  Ovid. 
You  are  lucky  in  ClifTord's  Inn,  where  I  think  you  have  few 
ricks  or  stacks  worth  the  burning.     Pray  keep  as  little  corn 
by  you  as  you  can,  for  fear  of  the  worst.     It  was  never  good 
times  in  England  since  the  poor  began  to  speculate  upon  their 
condition.     Formerly  they  jogged  on  with  as  little  reflection 
as   horses.     The   whistling  ploughman  went  cheek   by  jowl 
with  his  brother  that  neighed.     Now  the  biped  carries  a  box 
of  phosphorus  in  his  leather  breeches,  and  in  the  dead  of 
night  the  half-illuminated  beast  steals  his  magic  potion  into  a 
cleft  in  the  barn,  and  half  the  country  is  grinning  with  new 
fires.     Farmer  Graystock  said  something  to  the  touchy  rustic 
that  he  did  not  relish,  and  he  writes  his  distaste  in  flames. 
What  a  power  to  intoxicate  his  rude  brains,  just  muddlingly 
awake  to  perceive  that  something  is  wrong  in  the  social  sys- 
tem— what   a  hellish   faculty   above  gunpowder  !     Now  the 
rich  and  poor  are  fairly  pitted.     We  shall  see  who  can  hang 
or  burn  the  fastest.     It  is  not  always  revenge  that  stimulates 
these   kindlings.      There    is   a  love    of   exciting    mischief! 
Think  of  a  disrespected  clod,  that  was  trod  into  earth  ;  that 
was  nothing;  on  a  sudden,  by  damned  arts,  refined  into  an  ex- 
terminating angel,  devouring  the  fruits  of  the  earth  and  their 
growers   in  a  mass  of  fire ;  what  a  new  existence  !     What  a 
temptation  above  Lucifer's  !     Why,  here  was  a  spectacle  last 
night  for  a  whole  country,  a  bonfire  visible  to  London,  alarm- 
ing her  guilty  towers,  and  shaking  the  monument  with  an  ague 
fit,  all  done  by  a  little  vial  of  phosphor  in  a  clown's  fob.     How 
he  must  grin  and  shake  his  empty  noddle  in  clouds  !     The 
Vulcanian  epicure  !     Alas  I  can  we  ring  the  bells  backward  ? 
Can  we  unlearn  the  arts  that  pretend  to  civilize,  and  then  burn 
the  world  ?     There  is  a  march  of  science  ;  but  who  shall  beat 
the  drums  for  its  retreat  ?      Who  shall  persuade  the  boor  thnt 
phosphor  will  not  ignite  ?     Seven  goodly  stacks  of  hay,  with 
corn-barns  proportionable,  lie  smoking  ashes  and  chaff,  which 
man  and  beast  would  sputter  out  and  reject  like  those  apples 
of  asphaltes  and  bitumen.     The   food   for  the  inhabitants  of 
earth   will  quickly   disappear.     Hot  rolls  may  say,  Fuimus 
panes,   fuit  quartprn-loaf,  et   ingens    gloria   apple-pasty-orum. 
That  the  good  old  munching  system  may  last  thy  time  and 


LETTER    TO    SOUTHEY.  293 

mine,    good  un-incendiary  George  !  is  the  devout  prayer  of 
thine. 

"  To  the  last  arust, 

"C.  Lamb." 

Lamb's  kindness  to  Hone  was  not  confined  to  his  contri- 
butions to  the  "  Every-day  Book"  and  the  "  Table  Book." 
Those  pleasant  and  blameless  works  had  failed  to  supply  an 
adequate  income  to  a  numerous  family,  and  Lamb  was  desi- 
rous of  interesting  his  influential  friends  in  a  new  project  of 
Hone's,  to  establish  himself  in  a  coffee-house  conducted  in  a 
superior  style.  With  this  view  he  wrote  to  Southey,  who, 
nobly  forgetting  Hone's  old  heresies  in  politics  or  parodies, 
had  made  a  genial  reference  to  his  late  work  in  his  "  Life  of 
Bunyan." 

TO    MR.    SOUTHEY. 

*'  Dear  Southey — My  friend  Hone,  whom  you  would  like 
for  c  friend,!  found  deeply  impressed  with  your  generous  no- 
tice of  him  in  your  beautiful  '  Life  of  Bunyan,'  which  I  am 
just  now  full  of.  He  has  written  to  you  for  leave  to  publish 
a  certain  good-natured  letter.  I  write  not  this  to  enforce  his 
request,  for  we  are  fully  aware  that  the  refusal  of  such  publi- 
cation would  be  quite  consistent  with  all  that  is  good  in  your 
character.  Neither  he  nor  I  expect  it  from  you,  nor  exact  it ; 
but  if  you  would  consent  to  it,  you  would  have  me  obliged  by 
it  as  well  as  him.  What  right  I  have  to  interfere  you  best 
know.  Look  on  me  as  a  dog  who  went  once  temporarily  in- 
sane, and  bit  you,  and  now  begs  for  a  crust.  Will  you  set 
your  wits  to  a  dog  ? 

"  Our  object  is  to  open  a  subscription,  which  my  friends  of 

the are   most  willing  to  forward  him,  but  think  that  a 

leave  from  you  to  publish  would  aid  it. 

"  But  not  an  atom  of  respect  or  kindness  will  or  shall  abate 
in  either  of  us  if  you  decline  it.  Have  this  strongly  in  your 
mind. 

"Those  *  Every-day'  and  'Table'  Books  will  be  a  treasure 
a  hundred  years  hence,  but  they  have  failed  to  make  Hone's 
fortune. 

"  Here  his  wife  and  all  his  children  are  about  me,  gaping 
for  coffee  customers  ;  but  how  should  they  come  in,  seeing 
no  pot  boiling ! 

"Enough  of  Hone.     I  saw  Coleridge  a  day  or  two  since. 
He  has  had  some  severe  attack,  not  paralytic  ;  but,  if  I  had 
not  heard  of  it,  I  should  not  have  found  it  out.      He  looks,  and 
especially   speaks,  strong.      How  are    all  the   Wordsworlhs 
25* 


294  LETTERS    TO    MRS.    WILLIAMS. 

and  all  the  Southeys,  whom  I  am  obliged  to  you  if  you  have 
not  brought  up  haters  of  the  name  of 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  P.S. — I  have  gone  lately  into  the  acrostic  line.  I  find 
genius  (such  as  I  had)  declines  with  me,  but  I  get  clever. 
Do  you  know  anybody  that  wants  charades  or  such  things 
for  albums  ?  I  do  'em  at  so  much  a  sheet.  Perhaps  an  epi- 
gram (not  a  very  happy-gram)  I  did  for  a  schoolboy  yesterday 
may  amuse.  1  pray  Jove  he  may  not  get  a  flogging  for  any 
false  quantity  ;  but  'tis,  with  one  exception,  the  only  Latin 
verses  I  have  made  for  forty  years,  and  I  did  it  '  to  order.' 

CUIQUE  SUUM. 

Adsciscit  sibi  divitias  et  opes  alienas 

Fur,  rapiens,  spolians,  quod  mihi,  quod-que  tibi, 

Proprium  erat,  temnens  hsec  verba,  meum-que,  luum-que  ; 
Omne  suum  est :  tandem  Cui-que  Suum  tribuit. 

Dat  vesti  colluin  ;  restes,  vah  !   carnifici  dat ; 
Se  se  Diaboio,  sic  bene  ;   Cuique  Suum. 

"  I  write  from  Hone's,  therefore  Mary  cannot  send  her  love 
to  Mrs.  Southey,  but  I  do. 

"  Yours  ever, 

"  C.  L." 

In  1830  Lamb  took  a  journey  to  Bury  St.  Edmund's,  to 
fetch  Miss  Isola  to  her  adopted  home,  from  a  visit  which  had 
been  broken  by  her  illness.  It  was  on  his  return  that  Lamb's 
repartee  to  the  query  of  the  statistical  gentleman  as  to  the 
prospects  of  the  turnip  crop,  which  has  been  repeatedly  pub- 
lished, was  made.  The  following  is  his  own  version  of  it, 
contained  in  a  letter  addressed  to  Miss  Isola's  hostess  on  their 
arrival. 

"A  rather  talkative  gentleman,  but  very  civil,  engaged  me 
in  a  discourse  for  full  twenty  miles  on  the  probable  advantages 
of  steam  carriages,  which,  being  merely  problematical,  I  bore 
my  part  in  with  some  credit,  in  spite  of  my  totally  un-engineer- 
like  faculties.  But  when,  somewhere  about  Stanstead,  he  put 
an  unfortunate  question  to  me  as  to  the  '  probability  of  its  turn- 
ing out  a  good  turnip  season,'  and  when  I,  who  am  still  less 
of  an  agriculturist  than  a  steam  philosopher,  not  knowing  a 
turnip  from  a  potato  ground,  innocently  made  answer  that '  I 
believed  it  depended  very  much  upon  boiled  legs  of  mutton,' 
my  unlucky  reply  set  Miss  Isola  a  laughing  to  a  degree  that 
disturbed  her  tranquillity  for  the  only  moment  in  our  journey. 
I  am  afraid  my  credit  sank  very  low  with  my  other  fellow- 
traveller,  who  had  thought  he  had  met  with  a  well-informed 


ALBUM    VERSES.  295 

passenger,  which  is  an  accident  so  desirable  in  a  stagecoach. 
We  were  rather  less  communicative,  but  still  friendly,  the  rest 
of  the  way." 

To  the  same  lady,  having  sent  him  an  acrostic  on  his  sis- 
ter's name,  he  replied  with  a  letter  which  contained  one  on 
hers,  and  the  following  notice  of  his  own  talent  in  the  acrostic 
line. 

*'  Dear  Madam — I  do  assure  you  that  your  verses  gratified  me 
very  much,  and  my  sister  is  quite  proud  of  them.  For  the  first 
time  in  my  life  I  congratulated  myself  upon  the  shortness  and 
meanness  of  my  name.  Had  it  been  for  Schwartzenberg  or 
Esterhazy,  it  would  have  put  you  to  some  puzzle.  1  am  afraid 
I  shall  sicken  you  of  acrostics,  but  this  last  was  written  to  or- 
der. I  beg  you  to  have  inserted  in  your  county  paper  something 
like  this  advertisement.  '  To  the  nobility,  gentry,  and  others 
about  Bury.  C.  Lamb  respectfully  informs  his  friends  and  the 
public  in  general,  that  he  is  leaving  oflf  business  m  the  acrostic 
line,  as  he  is  going  into  an  entirely  new  line.  Rebuses  and 
charades  done  as  usual,  and  upon  the  old  terms.  Also,  epi- 
taphs to  suit  the  memory  of  any  person  deceased.' 

"  I  thought  1  had  adroitly  escaped  the  rather  unpliable  name 
of  '  Williams'  curtailing  your  poor  daughter's  verses  to  her 
proper  surnames,  but  it  seems  you  would  not  let  me  off  so 
easily.  If  these  trifles  amuse  you,  I  am  paid.  Though  really 
'tis  an  operation  so  much  like — 'A,  apple-pie;  B,  bit  it.'  To 
make  amends,  I  request  leave  to  lend  you  the  '  Excursion,'  and 
to  recommend,  in  particular,  the  '  Churchyard  Stories  ;'  in  the 
seventh  book,  I  think.  I'hey  will  strengthen  the  tone  of  your 
mind  after  its  weak  diet  on  acrostics." 

In  1830  a  small  volume  of  poems,  the  gleanings  of  some 

years,  during  which  Lamb  had  devoted  himself  to  prose,  under 

his  name  of  "  Elia,"  was  published  by  iVIr.  Moxon,  under  the 

title  of  "  Album  Verses,"   and   which    Lamb,  in   token  of  his 

strong  regard,  dedicated  to  the   publisher.      An  unf;ivuurablo 

review  of  them  in  the  Literary  Gazette  produced  some  verses 

from  Soulhey,  which  were  inserted  in  the  Times,  and  of  which 

the  following,  as  evincing  his  unchanged  friendship,  may  not 

unfitly  be  inserted  here.     The  residue,  being  more  severe  on 

Lamb's  critics  than  Lamb  himself  would  have  wished,  may  now 

be  spared. 

Charles  Lamb,  to  those  who  know  thee  justly  dear 
For  rarest  genius,  and  for  sterling  worth, 
Unchanging  Iriendship,  warmth  of  heart  sincere, 
And  wit  that  never  gave  an  ill  thought  birth. 


296  UAZHTT. 

Nor  ever  in  its  sport  infix'd  a  sting  ; 
To  us,  who  have  admired  and  loved  thee  long, 
It  is  a  proud  as  well  as  pleasant  thing 
To  hear  thy  good  report,  now  borne  along 
Upon  the  honest  breath  of  public  praise  : 
We  know  that,  with  the  elder  sons  of  song. 
In  honouring  whom  thou  hast  delighted  still. 
Thy  name  shall  keep  its  course  to  after  days. 

This  year  closed  upon  the  grave  of  HazHtt.  liamb  visited 
him  frequently  during  his  last  illness,  and  attended  his  funeral. 
They  had  taken  great  delight  in  each  other's  conversation  for 
many  years  ;  and  though  the  indifference  of  Lamb  to  the  ob- 
jects of  Hazlitt's  passionate  love  or  hatred,  as  a  politician,  at 
one  time  produced  a  coolness,  the  warmth  of  the  defence  of 
Hazlitt  in  "  Elia's  Letter  to  Southey"  renewed  the  old  regard 
of  the  philosopher,  and  set  all  to  rights.  Hazlitt,  in  his  turn, 
as  an  Edinburgh  Reviewer,  had  opportunities  which  he  de- 
lighted to  use,  of  alluding  to  Lamb's  Specimens  and  Essays, 
and  making  him  amends  for  the  severity  of  ancient  criticism, 
which  the  editor,  who  could  well  afford  the  genial  inconsist- 
ency, was  too  generous  to  exclude.  The  conduct,  indeed,  of 
that  distinguished  person  to  Hazlitt,  especially  in  his  last  ill- 
ness, won  Lamb's  admiration,  and  wholly  effaced  the  recollec- 
tion of  the  time  when,  thirty  years  before,  his  play  had  been 
denied  critical  mercy  under  his  rule.  Hazlitt's  death  did  not 
so  much  shock  Lamb  at  the  time,  as  it  weighed  down  his 
spirits  afterward,  when  he  felt  the  want  of  those  essays 
which  he  had  used  periodically  to  look  for  with  eagerness  in 
the  magazines  and  reviews,  which  they  alone  made  tolerable 
to  him ;  and  when  he  realized  the  dismal  certainty  that  he 
should  never  again  enjoy  that  rich  discourse  of  old  poets  and 
painters  with  which  so  many  a  long  winter's  night  had  been 
gladdened,  or  taste  life  with  an  additional  relish  in  the  keen 
sense  of  enjoyment  which  endeared  it  to  his  companion. 


CHAPTER  XVni. 

[1830  to  1834.] 
Lamb's  last  Letters  and  Death. 

After  the  year  1830  Lamb's  verses  and  essays  were  chiefly 
given  to  his  friends  ;  the  former  consisting  of  album  contribu- 
tions, the  latter  of  little  essences  of  observation  and  criticism. 
Mr.  Moxon,  having;  established   a  new  magazine,  called  the 


LETTER    TO    DYER.  297 

•*  Englishman's  Magazine,"  induced  him  to  write  a  series  of 
papers,  some  of  which  were  not  inferior  to  his  happiest  es- 
says. At  tins  time  his  old  and  excellent  friend,  Dyer,  was 
much  annoyed  by  some  of  his  witticisms — which,  in  truth, 
were  only  Lamb's  modes  of  expressing  his  deep-seated  regard  ; 
and  at  the  quotation  of  a  couplet  in  one  of  his  early  poems, 
which  he  had  suppressed  as  liable  to  be  misconstrued  by  Mr. 
Rogers.  Mr.  Barker  had  unfortunately  met  with  the  unex- 
purgated  edition  which  contained  this  dubious  couplet,  and  in 
his  "  Memorials  of  Dr.  Parr"  quoted  the  passage  ;  which,  to 
Mr.  Dyer's  delicate  feelings,*  conveyed  the  apprehension  that 
Mr.  Rogers  would  treat  the  suppression  as  colourable,  and 
refer  the  revival  of  the  lines  to  his  sanction.  The  following 
letter  was  written  to  dispel  those  fears  from  his  mind. 

TO    MR,    DYER. 

"  Dear  Dyer — Mr.  Rogers  and  Mr.  Rogers's  friends  are 
perfectly  assured  that  you  never  intended  any  harm  by  an  in- 
nocent couplet,  and  that  in  the  revivification  of  it  by  blundering 
Barker  you  had  no  hand  whatever.  To  imagine  that,  at  this 
time  of  day,  Rogers  broods  over  a  fantastic  expression  of  more 
than  thirty  years'  standing,  would  be  to  suppose  him  indulging 
his  'pleasures  of  memory'  with  a  vengeance.  You  never 
penned  a  line  which  for  its  own  sake  you  need,  dying,  wish 
to  blot.  You  mistake  your  heart  if  you  think  you  can  write  a 
lampoon.  Your  whips  are  rods  of  roses.  Your  spleen  has 
ever  had  for  its  object  vices,  not  the  vicious  ;  abstract  offen- 
ces, not  the  concrete  sinner.  But  you  are  sensitive,  and  wince 
as  much  at  the  consciousness  of  having  committed  a  compli- 
ment as  another  man  would  at  the  perpetration  of  an  affront. 
But  do  not  lug  me  into  the  same  soreness  of  conscience  with 
yourself.  I  maintain,  and  will  to  the  last  hour,  that  I  never 
writ  of  you  but  con  amore.     That  if  any  allusion  was  made 

♦Mr.  Dyer  also  complained  to  Mr.  Lambof  some  suggestions  in  Ella,  which 
annoyed  him,  not  so  much  for  his  own  sake  as  for  the  sake  of  others  who,  in 
the  delicacy  of  his  apprehen.siveness,  he  thought  might  feel  aggrieved  t)y  im- 
putations which  were  certainly  nut  intended,  and  which  they  dul  not  deserve. 
One  passage  in  Elia,  hinting  that  he  had  \M-ifx\  hardlv  dealt  witli  by  school- 
masters, under  whom  he  had  been  a  teacher  in  his  yuunger  days,  luirt  him  ; 
as,  in  fact,  he  was  treated  by  ihem  with  the  most  considerate  generosity  and 
kindness.  Another  passage  which  he  regarded  as  implying  that  he  had  been 
underpaid  by  booksellers  also  vexed  him  ;  as  his  labours  have  always  been 
highly  esteemed,  and  have,  accortiing  to  the  rate  of  remuneration  of  learned 
men,  been  well  compensated  by  .Mr.  Valpy  and  others.  The  truth  is,  that 
Lamb  wrote  Irom  a  vague  recollection,  witliout  intending  any  personal  refer- 
ence at  all  to  Mr.  Dyer  himself,  and  only  seeking  to  illustrate  the  pure,  sim- 
ple, and  elevated  character  of  a  man  of  letters,  "  unsjiolted  from  the  world." 
Probably  no  one  has  ever  applied  these  suggestions  to  the  parties  for  whose 
reputation  Mr.  Dyer  has  been  so  honourably  anxious  but  himself;  but  it  is  due 
to  his  feelings  to  state  that  thev  are  founded  in  error. 


298  LETTER  TO  DYER. 

to  your  near-sightedness,  it  was  not  for  the  purpose  of  mocking 
an  infirmity,  but  of  connecting  it  with  scholar-like  habits  ;  for, 
is  it  not  erudite  and  scholarly  to  be  somewhat  near  of  sight 
before  age  naturally  brings  on  the  malady  ?  You  could 
not  then  plead  the  obrepens  senectus.  Did  I  not,  moreover, 
make  it  an  apology  for  a  certain  absence,  which  some  of  your 
friends  may  have  experienced  when  you  have  not  on  a  sudden 
made  recognition  of  them  in  a  casual  street-meeting?  And 
did  I  not  strengthen  your  excuse  for  this  slowness  of  recogni- 
tion by  further  accounting  morally  for  the  present  engagement 
of  your  mind  in  worthy  objects  1  Did  I  not,  in  your  person, 
make  the  handsomest  apology  for  absent-of-mind  people  that 
was  ever  made  1  If  these  things  be  not  so,  1  never  knew  what 
I  wrote  or  meant  by  my  writing,  and  have  been  penning  libels  all 
my  life  without  being  aware  of  it.  Does  it  follow  that  I  should 
have  expressed  myself  exactly  in  the  same  way  of  those  dear 
old  eyes  of  yours  now,  now  that  Father  Time  has  conspired 
with  a  hard  taskmaster  to  put  a  last  extinguisher  upon  them  1 
I  should  as  soon  have  insulted  the  Answerer  of  Salmasius, 
when  he  awoke  up  from  his  ended  task,  and  saw  no  more  with 
mortatvision.  But  you  are  many  films  removed  yet  from  Mil- 
ton's calamity.  You  write  perfectly  intelligibly.  Marry,  the  let- 
ters are  not  all  of  the  same  size  or  lallness  ;  but  that  only  shows 
your  proficiency  in  the  hands,  text,  German-hand,  court-hand, 
sometimes  law-hand,  and  affords  variety.  You  pen  better  than 
you  did  a  twelvemonth  ago  ;  and  if  you  continue  to  improve,  you 
bid  fair  to  win  the  golden  pen  which  is  the  prize  at  your  young 
gentlemen's  academy.  But  you  must  be  aware  of  Valpy  and 
his  printing-house,  that  hazy  cave  of  Trophonius,  out  of  which 
it  was  a  mercy  that  you  escaped  with  a  glimmer.  Beware  ol 
MSS.  and  Variae  Lectiones.  Settle  the  text  for  once  in  your 
mind,  and  stick  to  it.  You  have  some  years'  good  sight  in 
you  yet  if  you  do  not  tamper  with  it.  It  is  not  for  you  (for 
us  1  should  say)  to  go  poring  into  Greek  contractions,  and 
stargazing  upon  slim  Hebrew  points.     We  have  yet  the  sight 

Of  sun,  and  moon,  and  star  throughout  the  year, 
And  man  and  woman. 

You  have  vision  enough  to  discern  Mrs.  Dyer  from  the  other 
comely  gentlewoman  who  lives  up  at  staircase  No.  5  ;  or,  if 
you  should  make  a  blunder  in  the  twilight,  Mrs.  Dyer  has  too 
much  good  sense  to  be  jealous  for  a  mere  effect  of  imperfect 
optics.  But  don't  try  to  write  the  Lord's  Prayer,  Creed,  and 
Ten  Commandments  in  the  compass  of  a  halfpenny  ;  nor  run 
after  a  midge  or  a  mote  to  catch  it,  and  leave  off  hunting  for 
needles  in  bushels  of  hay,  for  all  these  things  strain  the  eyes. 


LETTER    TO    CAREY.  299 

The  snow  is  six  feet  deep  in  some  parts  here.  I  must  put 
on  jack-boots  to  get  at  the  postoffice  with  this.  It  is  not  good 
for  weak  eyes  to  pore  upon  snow  too  much.  It  lies  in  drifts. 
I  wonder  what  its  drift  is;  only  that  it  makes  good  pancakes, 
remind  Mrs.  Dyer.  It  turns  a  pretty  green  world  into  a  white 
one.  It  glares  too  much  for  an  innocent  colour,  methinks.  I 
wonder  why  you  think  I  dislike  gilt  edges.  They  set  off  a 
letter  marvellously.  Yours,  for  instance,  looks  for  all  the 
world  like  a  tablet  of  curious  hieroglyphics  in  a  gold  frame. 
But  don't  go  and  lay  this  to  your  eyes.  You  always  wrote 
hieroglyphically,  yet  not  to  come  up  to  the  mystical  notations 
and  conjuring  characters  of  Doctor  Parr.     You  never  wrote 

what  I  call  a  schoolmaster's  hand,  like  C ;  nor  a  woman's 

hand,  like  S   —  ;  nor  a  Missal  hand,  like  Porson  ;  nor  an 

all-of-lhe-wrong-side  sloping  hand,  like  Miss  H ;  nor  a 

dogmatic,   Mede-and-Persian,  peremptory  hand,  like  R ; 

but  you  ever  wrote  what  I  call  a  Grecian's  hand  ;  what  the 
Grecians  write  (or  used)  at  Christ's  Hospital ;  such  as  Whal- 
ley  would  have  admired,  and  Boyer  have  applauded,  but  Smith 
or  Atwood  (writing-masters)  would  have  horsed  you  for. 
Your  boy-of-genius  hand  and  your  mercantile  hand  are  vari- 
ous. By  your  flourishes,  I  should  think  you  never  learned  to 
make  eagles,  or  corkscrews,  or  flourish  the  governors'  names 
in  the  writing-school ;  and,  by  the  tenour  and  cut  of  your  let- 
ters, I  suspect  you  were  never  in  it  at  all.  By  the  length  of 
this  scrawl  you  will  think  I  have  a  design  on  your  optics  ;  but 
I  have  writ  as  large  as  I  could,  out  of  respect  to  them  ;  too 
large,  indeed,  for  beauty.  Mine  is  a  sort  of  deputy  Grecian's 
hand  ;  a  little  better,  and  more  of  a  worldly  hand  than  a  Gre- 
cian's, but  still  remote  from  the  mercantile.  I  don't  know 
how  it  is,  but  I  keep  my  rank  in  fancy  still  since  schooldays. 
I  can  never  forget  I  was  a  deputy  Grecian  !  And  writing  to 
you,  or  to  Coleridge,  besides  affection,  I  feel  a  reverential 
deference  as  to  Grecians  still.  I  keep  my  soaring  way  above 
the  Great  Erasmians,  yet  far  beneath  the  other.  Alas  !  what 
am  I  now?  what  is  a  Leadenhall  clerk  or  India  pensioner  to 
a  deputy  Grecian?  How  art  thou  fallen,  oh  Lucifer!  Just 
room  for  our  loves  to  Mrs.  D.,  <fcc. 

*^  C.  Lamb." 


The  following  letter  is 


TO    MR.    CAREY. 


"  Assidens  est  mihi  bona  soror,  Euripiden  evolvens,  donum 
vestrum,  carissime  Carey,  pro  quo  gratias  agimus,  lecturi  at- 
que  iterum  lecturi  idem.     Pergratus  est  liber  ambobus,  nempe 


300  I'O    THE    EDITOR    OF    THE    "  ATHEN^UM.^' 

'  Sacerdofis  Commiseralionis,'  sacrum  opus  a  te  ipso  Humanis- 
simae  Religionis  Sacerdote  dono  datum.  Lachrymantes  gavis- 
uri  sumus  ;  est  ubi  dolor  fiat  voluptas  ;  nee  semper  dulce  mihi 
est  ridere ;  aliquando  commutandum  est  he  !  he  !  he  !  cum 
heu  !  heu !  heu ! 

"A  Musis  Tragicis  me  non  penitus  abhorruisse  testis  sit 
Carmen  Calamitosum,  nescio  quo  autore  lingud  prius  vernac- 
iil&  scriptum,  et  nuperrim^,  a  me  ipso  Latine  versum,  scilicet; 
*  Tom  Tom  of  Islington.'     Tenuistine  ? 

'  Thomas  Thomas  de  Islington, 
Uxorem  duxit  Die  quadam  Solis, 
Abduxit  domum  sequenti  die, 
Emit  baculum  subsequenti, 
Vapulat  ilia  poster^, 
jEgrotat  succedenti,  Mortua  fit  crastinA.' 

Et  miro  gaudio  afiicitur  Thomas  luce  posterd  quod  subsequen- 
ti (nempe,  Dominica)  uxor  sit  efferenda. 

'  En  Iliades  Domesticas ! 
En  circulum  calamitatum ! 
Plane  hebdomadalem  tragoidiam.' 

I  nunc  et  confer  Euripiden  vestram  his  luctibus,  hdc  morte 

uxori^ ;  confer  Alcesten  !  Hecuben  !  quas  non  antiquas  Hero- 

inas  Dolorosas. 

"  Suffundor  genas  lachrymis  tantas  strages  revolvens.    Quid 

restat  nisi  quod  Tecum  Tuam  Caram  salutamus  ambosque  va- 

lere  jubeamus,  nosmet  ipsi  bene  valentes. 

"  Elia. 

"  Datum  ab  agro  Enfeldiensi,  Maii  die  sextd,  1831." 

The  death  of  Munden  reviving  his  recollections  of  "  the 
veteran  comedian,"  called  forth  the  follovi^ing  letter  of  11th 
February,  1832,  to  the  editor  of  the  AthencBum,  whom  Lamb 
had,  for  a  long  time,  numbered  among  his  friends. 

TO    THE    EDITOR    OF    THE    "  ATHENiEIJM." 

'•  Dear  Sir — Your  communication  to  me  of  the  death  of 
Munden  made  me  weep.  Now,  sir,  I  am  not  of  the  melting 
mood ;  but,  in  these  serious  times,  the  loss  of  half  the  world's 
fun  is  no  trivial  deprivation.  It  was  my  loss  (or  gain  shall  I 
call  it)  in  the  early  time  of  my  play-going,  to  have  missed  all 
Munden's  acting.  There  was  only  he  and  Lewis  at  Covent 
Garden,  while  Drury  Lane  was  exuberant  with  Parsons,  Dodd, 
&c.,  such  a  comic  company  as,  I  suppose,  the  stage  never 
showed.  Thence,  in  the  evening  of  my  life  I  had  Munden 
all  to  myself,  more  mellowed,  richer,  perhaps,  than  ever.  I 
cannot  say  what  his  change  of  faces  produced  in  me.  It  was 
not  acting.     He  was  not  one  of  my  '  old  actors.'     It  might  be 


TO    THE    EDITOR    OF    THE    "  ATHEN^UM."  301 

better.  His  power  was  extravagant.  I  saw  him  one  evening 
in  three  drunken  characters.  Three  farces  were  played.  One 
part  was  Dosey — I  forget  the  rest ;  but  they  were  so  discrim- 
inated that  a  stranger  miglit  have  seen  them  all,  and  not  have 
dreamed  that  he  was  seeing  the  same  actor.  I  am  jealous 
for  the  actors  who  pleased  my  youth.  He  was  not  a  Parsons 
or  a  Dodd,  but  he  was  more  wonderful.  He  seemed  as  if  he 
could  do  anythmg.  He  was  not  an  actor,  but  something  bet- 
ter, if  you  please.  Shall  I  instance  Old  Foresight,  in  'Love 
for  Love,'  in  which  Parsons  was  at  once  the  old  man,  the  as- 
trologer, &c.  Munden  dropped  the  old  man,  the  doter — 
which  makes  the  character — but  he  substituted  for  it  a  moon- 
struck character,  a  perfect  abstraction  from  this  earth,  that 
looked  as  if  he  had  newly  come  down  from  the  planets.  Now 
that  is  not  what  I  call  acting.  It  might  be  better.  He  was 
imaginative  ;  he  could  impress  upon  an  audience  an  idea — 
the  low  one,  perhaps,  of  a  leg  of  mutton  and  turnips  ;  but  such 
was  the  grandeur  and  singleness  of  his  expressions,  that  that 
single  expression  would  convey  to  all  his  auditory  a  notion 
of  all  the  pleasures  they  had  all  received  from  all  the  legs  of 
mutton  and  turnips  they  had  ever  eaten  in  their  lives.  Now 
this  is  not  acting,  nor  do  I  set  down  Munden  among  my  old 
actors.  He  was  only  a  wonderful  man,  exerting  his  vivid  im- 
pressions through  the  agency  of  the  stage.  In  one  only  thing 
did  I  see  him  act — that  is,  support  a  character ;  it  was  in  a 
wretched  farce,  called  '  Johnny  Gilpin,'  for  Dowton's  benefit, 
in  which  he  did  a  cockney.  The  thing  ran  but  one  night ; 
but  when  I  say  that  Liston's  Lubin  Log  was  nothing  to  it,  I 
say  little ;  it  was  transcendent.  And  here  let  me  say  of 
actors,  envious  actors,  that  of  Munden,  Liston  was  used  to 
speak,  almost  with  the  enthusiasm  due  to  the  dead,  in  terms 
of  such  allowed  superiority  to  every  actor  on  the  stage,  and 
this  at  a  time  when  Munden  was  gone  by  in  the  world's  es- 
timation, that  it  convinced  me  that  artists  (in  which  term  I  in- 
clude poets,  painters,  &lc.)  are  not  so  envious  as  the  world 
think.  I  have  little  lime,  and  therefore  enclose  a  criticism  on 
Munden's  Old  Dosey  and  his  general  acting,*  by  a  friend. 

"  C.  Lamb." 
"  Mr.  Munden  appears  to  us  to  be  the  most  classical  of  ac- 
tors. He  is  that  in  high  farce  which  Keinblo  was  in  high 
tragedy.  The  lines  of  these  great  artists  are,  it  must  be  ad- 
mitted, sufficiently  distinct;  but  the  same  elements  are  in 
both — the  same  directness  of  purpose,  the  same  singleness  of 

*  A  little  article  inserted  in  "  The  (Champion"  before  Lamb  wrote  his  essay 
OQ  the  Acting  of  Munden.  Lamb's  repetition  may  cast  on  it  suflkient  inter- 
est to  excuse  its  repetition  here. 

26 


302  TO    THE    EDITOR    OF    THE    "  ATHEN^UM- 

aim,  the  concentration  of  power,  the  same  iron-casing  of  in- 
flexible manner,  the  same  statue-like  precision  of  gesture, 
movement,  and  attitude.  The  hero  of  farce  is  as  little  affect- 
ed with  impulses  from  without  as  the  retired  Prince  of  Tra- 
gedians. There  is  something  solid,  sterling,  almost  adaman- 
tine, in  the  building  up  of  his  most  grotesque  characters. 
When  he  fixes  his  wonder-working  face  in  any  of  its  most 
amazing  varieties,  it  looks  as  if  the  picture  were  carved  out 
from  a  rock  by  Nature  in  a  sportive  vein,  and  might  last  for 
ever.  It  is  like  what  we  can  imagine  a  mask  of  the  old  Gre- 
cian comedy  to  have  been,  only  that  it  lives,  and  breathes, 
and  changes.  His  most  fantastical  gestures  are  the  grand 
ideal  of  farce.  He  seems  as  though  he  belonged  to  the  earli- 
est and  the  stateliest  age  of  comedy,  when,  instead  of  super- 
ficial foibles  and  the  airy  varieties  of  fashion,  she  had  the 
grand  asperities  of  man  to  work  on,  when  her  grotesque  ima- 
ges had  something  romantic  about  them,  and  when  humour 
and  parody  were  themselves  heroic.  His  expressions  of  feel- 
ing and  bursts  of  enthusiasm  are  among  the  most  genuine 
which  we  have  ever  felt.  They  seem  to  come  up  from  a 
depth  of  emotion  in  the  heart,  and  burst  through  the  sturdy 
casing  of  manner  with  a  strength  which  seems  increased  ten- 
fold by  its  real  and  hearty  obstacle.  The  workings  of  his 
spirit  seem  to  expand  his  frame,  till  we  can  scarcely  believe 
that  by  measure  it  is  small  ;  for  the  space  which  he  fills  in 
the  imagination  is  so  real,  that  we  almost  mistake  it  for  that 
of  corporeal  dimensions.  His  Old  Dosey,  in  the  excellent 
farce  of  *  Past  Ten  o'Clock,'  is  his  grandest  effort  of  this  kind, 
and  we  know  of  nothing  finer.  He  seems  to  have  a  '  heart  of 
oak'  indeed.  His  description  of  a  seafight  is  the  most  noble 
and  triumphant  piece  of  enthusiasm  which  we  remember.  It 
is  as  if  the  spirits  of  a  whole  crew  of  nameless  heroes  '  were 
swelling  in  his  bosom.'  We  never  felt  so  ardent  and  proud  a 
sympathy  with  the  valour  of  England  as  when  we  heard  it. 
May  health  long  be  his,  thus  to  do  our  hearts  good — for  we 
never  saw  any  actor  whose  merits  have  the  least  resemblance 
to  his  even  in  species :  and  when  his  genius  is  withdrawn 
from  the  stage,  we  shall  not  have  left  even  a  term  by  which 
we  can  fitly  describe  it." 

Coleridge,  now  in  declining  health,  seems  to  have  feared, 
from  a  long  intermission  of  Lamb's  visits  to  Highgate,  that 
there  was  some  estrangement  between  them,  and  to  have 
written  to  Lamb  under  that  fear.  The  following  note  shows 
how  much  he  was  mistaken. 


LETTER   TO    CAREY.  303 

TO    MR.    COLERIDGE. 

"April  14,  1832. 

•'  My  dear  Coleridge — Not  an  unkind  thought  has  passed 
in  my  brain  about  you.  But  I  have  been  wofuUy  neglectful 
of  you,  so  that  I  do  not  deserve  to  announce  to  you,  that  if  I 
do  not  hear  from  you  before  then,  I  will  set  out  on  Wednes- 
day morning  to  take  you  by  the  hand.  I  would  do  it  this  mo- 
ment, but  an  unexpected  visit  might  flurry  you,  1  shall  take 
silence  for  acquiescence,  and  come.  I  am  glad  you  could 
write  so  long  a  letter.  Old  loves  to,  and  hope  of  kind  looks 
from,  the  Gilmans  when  1  come. 

"  Yours,  semper  idem^ 

'*C.  L. 

"If  you  ever  thought  an  offence,  much  more  wrote  it, 
against  me,  it  must  have  been  in  the  times  of  Noah,  and  the 
great  waters  swept  it  away.  Mary's  most  kind  love,  and  may 
be  a  wrong  prophet  of  your  bodings  ! — here  she  is  crying  for 
mere  love  over  your  letter.  I  wring  out  less,  but  not  sincerer 
showers. 

"  My  direction  is  simply  Enfield." 

Lamb's  regard  for  Mr.  Carey  had  now  ripened  into  a  fast 
friendship  ;  and,  by  agreement,  he  duied  every  third  Wednes- 
day in  the  month  at  the  Museum.  In  general,  these  were 
occasions  on  which  Lamb  observed  the  strictest  rules  of  tem- 
perance ;  but  once  accident  of  stomach  or  of  sentiment  caused 
a  woful  deviation,  which  Lamb  deplored  in  the  following 
letter. 

TO    >rR.    CAREY. 

"  I  protest  I  know  not  in  what  words  to  invest  my  sense  of 
the  shameful  violation  of  hospitality  which  I  was  guilty  of  on 
that  fatal  Wednesday.  Let  it  be  blotted  from  the  calendar. 
Had  it  been  committed  at  a  layman's  house,  say  a  merchant's, 
or  a  manufacturer's,  a  cheesemonger's,  or  green-grocer's,  or, 
to  go  higher,  a  barrister's,  a  member  of  parliament's,  a  rich 
banker's,  I  should  have  felt  alleviation,  a  drop  of  self-pity. 
But  to  be  seen  deliberately  to  go  out  of  the  house  of  a  clergy- 
man drunk  !  a  clergyman  of"  the  ('hurch  of  Kngland  too  !  not 
that  alone,  but  of  an  expounder  of  that  dark  Italian  IIhto- 
phant,  an  exposition  little  short  of  his  who  dared  unfold  the 
Apocalypse  ;  divine  riddles  both  ;  and,  without  supernal  grace 
vouchsafed,  arks  not  U)  be  lingered  without  present  blasting 
to  the  touchers.  And  then,  from  what  house  !  Not  a  com- 
mon glebe,  or  vicarage  (which  yet  had  been  shameful),  but 
from  a  kingly  repository  of  sciences,  human  and  divine,  with 


304  LETTER    TO    CAREY. 

the  Primate  of  England  for  its  guardian,  arrayed  in  public 
majesty,  from  which  the  profane  vulgar  are  bid  fly.  Could 
all  those  volumes  have  taught  me  nothing  better  ?  With  fe- 
verish eyes  on  the  succeeding  dawn  I  opened  upon  the  faint 
light,  enough  to  distinguish,  in  a  strange  chamber,  not  imme- 
diately to  be  recognised,  garters,  hose,  waistcoat,  neckerchief, 
arranged  in  dreadful  order  and  proportion,  which  I  knew  was 
not  mine  own.  'Tis  the  common  symptom,  on  awaking,  I 
judge  my  last  night's  condition  from.  A  tolerable  scattering 
on  the  floor  1  hail  as  being  too  probably  my  own,  and  if  the 
candlestick  be  not  removed,  I  assoil  myself.  But  this  fini- 
cal arrangement,  this  finding  everything  in  the  morning  in  ex- 
act diametrical  rectitude,  torments  me.  Remote  whispers 
suggested  that  I  coached  it  home  in  triumph.  Far  be  that  from 
working  pride  in  me,  for  I  was  unconscious  of  the  locomotion. 
That  a  young  Mentor  accompanied  a  reprobate  old  Telema- 
chus  ;  that,  the  Trojan  like,  he  bore  his  charge  upon  his 
shoulders,  while  the  wretched  incubus,  in  glimmering  sense, 
hiccoughed  drunken  snatches  of  flying  on  the  bats'  wings  after 
sunset.  An  aged  servitor  was  also  hinted  at,  to  make  dis- 
grace more  complete,  one  to  whom  my  ignominy  may  oflier  fur- 
ther occasions  of  revolt  (to  which  he  was  before  too  fondly 
inclining)  from  the  true  faith ;  for,  at  a  sight  of  helplessness, 
what  more  was  needed  to  drive  him  to  the  advocacy  of  inde- 
pendence 1  Occasion  led  me  through  Great  Russel-street 
yesterday.  I  gazed  at  the  great  knocker.  My  feeble  hands 
in  vain  essayed  to  lift  it.  I  dreaded  that  Argus,  who  doubt- 
less lanterned  me  out  on  that  prodigious  night,  I  called  the 
Elginian  marbles.  They  were  cold  to  my  suit.  1  shall 
never  again,  I  said,  on  the  wide  gates  unfolding,  say,  without 
fear  of  thrusting  back,  in  a  light  but  peremptory  air,  '  I  am  go- 
ing to  Mr.  Carey's.'  I  passed  by  the  walls  of  Balclutha.  I 
had  imaged  to  myself  a  zodiac  of  third  Wednesdays  irradiating 
by  glimpses  the  Edmonton  dulness.  I  dreamed  of  Highmore ! 
I  am  de-vited  to  come  on  Wednesdays.  Villanous  old  age, 
that,  with  second  childhood,  brings  linked  hand  in  hand  her 
inseparable  twin,  new  inexperience,  which  knows  not  effects 
of  liquor.  Where  I  was  to  have  sat  for  a  sober,  middle-aged- 
and-a-half-gentleman,  literary  too,  the  neat  fingered  artist  can 
educe  no  notions  but  of  a  dissoluted  Silenus,  lecturing  natural 
philosophy  to  a  jeering  Chromius,  or  a  Mnasilus,  Pudet.  From 
the  context  gather  the  lost  name  of -" 

In  1833  the  choicest  prose  essays  which  Lamb  had  writ- 
ten since  the  publication  of  Elia  were  collected  and  published 
— as  with  a  melancholy — under  the  title  of  "  The  last   Es- 


LETTER    TO    CAREY.  305 

says  of  Elia,"  by  Mr.  Moxon.  The  work  contains  ample 
proof  that  the  powers  of  the  author  had  ripened  rather  than 
declined  ;  for  the  paper  called  "  Blakesmoor  in  H — shire," 
which  imbodies  his  recollection  of  the  old  mansion  in  which 
his  grandmother  lived  as  housekeeper ;  those  on  Elliston, 
"  Captain  Jackson,"  and  "  The  Old  Margate  Hoy,"  are  among 
ihe  most  original,  the  least  constrained,  and  the  most  richly 
coloured  of  his  works.  It  was  favourably  noticed  by  almost 
all  the  principal  critics — by  many  enthusiastically  and  sincere- 
ly praised  ;  and  an  admirable  notice  in  ''  The  Quarterly"  was 
published  just  after  the  foreboding  of  the  title  was  fulfilled. 
His  indisposition  to  write,  however,  increased  ;  but  in  crea- 
ting so  much,  excellent  in  its  kind,  so  complete  in  itself,  and 
so  little  tinged  with  alloy,  he  had,  in  truth,  done  enough,  and 
had  earned  in  literature,  as  in  the  drudgery  of  the  desk,  a 
right  to  repose.  Yet,  still  ready  to  obey  the  call  of  friend- 
ship, he  wrote  both  prologue  and  epilogue  to  Knowles's  play 
of  "  The  Wife  ;"  the  composition  of  which  must  have  been 
mere  labour,  as  they  are  only  decently  suited  to  the  occasion, 
and  have  no  mark  or  likelihood  to  repay  the  vanity  of  the  poet. 
Miss  Isola's  marriage,  which  left  Lamb  and  his  sister  once 
more  alone,  induced  them  to  draw  a  little  nearer  to  their 
friends  ;  and  they  fixed  their  abode  in  Church-street,  Edmon- 
ton, within  reach  of  the  Enfield  walks  which  custom  had  en- 
deared to  them.  There  with  his  sister  he  continued,  regu- 
larly visiting  London  and  dining  with  Mr.  Carey  on  every  third 
Wednesday.  The  following  notelet  is  in  answer  to  a  letter 
enclosing  a  list  of  candidates  for  a  widow's  fund  society  for 
which  he  was  entitled  to  vote. 

TO    MR.    CAREY. 

"  Dear  Sir — The  unbounded  range  of  munificence  presented 
to  my  choice  staggers  me.  What  can  twenty  votes  do  for 
one  hundred  and  two  widows?  I  cast  my  eyes  hopeless 
among  the  viduage.  N.B.  Southey*  might  be  ashamed  of 
himself  to  let  his  aged  mother  stand  at  the  top  of  tlie  list,  with 
his  100/.  a  year  and  butt  of  sack.  {Sometimes  I  sigh  over 
No.  12,  Mrs.  Carve-ill,  some  poor  relation  of  mine,  no  doubt. 
No.  15  has  my  wishes,  but  then  she  is  a  Welsh  one.  I  have 
Ruth  upon  No.  21.  I'd  tug  hard  for  No.  24.  No.  25  is  an 
anomaly,  there  can  be  no  Mrs.  Hog.  No.  34  ensnares  me. 
No.  73  should  not  have  met  so  foolish  a  person.  No.  92  may 
bob  it  as  she  likes,  but  she  catches  no  cherry  of  me.  So  I 
have  even  fixed  at  hap-hazard,  as  you'll  see. 

"Yours,  every  third  Wednesday,  C.  li." 

♦  A  Mrs.  Southey  headed  the  enclosed  list. 
26» 


306  DEATH    OF    COLERIDGE. 

Lamb  was  entirely  destitute  of  what  is  commonly  called 
"  a  taste  for  music."  A  few  old  tunes  ran  in  his  head  ;  now 
and  then  the  expression  of  a  sentiment,  though  never  of  a  song, 
touched  him  with  rare  and  exquisite  delight ;  and  Braham  in 
his  youth,  Miss  Rennell,  who  died  too  soon,  and  who  used  to 
sing  the  charming  air,  "  In  infancy  our  hopes  and  fears,"  and 
Miss  Burrell,  won  his  ear  and  his  heart.  But,  usually,  music 
only  confused  him,  and  an  opera — to  which  he  once  or  twice 
tried  to  accompany  Miss  Isola — was  to  him  a  maze  of  sound 
in  which  he  almost  lost  his  wits.  But  he  did  not,  therefore, 
take  less  pleasure  in  the  success  of  Miss  Clara  Novello — 
whose  family  he  had  known  for  many  years,  and  to  whom  he 
addressed  the  following  lines,  which  were  inserted  in  the 
*'  Athenaeum"  of  July  26,  in  this  his  last  year. 

TO  CLARA  N . 

The  gods  have  made  me  most  unmusical, 

With  feelings  that  respond  not  to  the  call 

Of  stringed  harp,  or  voice— obtuse  and  mute 

To  hautboy,  sackbut,  dulcimer,  and  flute  ; 

King  David's  lyre,  that  made  the  madness  flee 

From  Saul,  had  been  but  a  Jew's-harp  to  me; 

Theorbos,  violins,  French  horns,  guitars, 

Leave  in  my  wounded  ears  inflicted  scars ; 

I  hate  those  trills,  and  shakes,  and  sounds  that  float 

Upon  the  captive  air  ;  I  know  no  note, 

Nor  ever  shall,  whatever  folks  may  say, 

Of  the  strange  mysteries  of  Sol  and  Fa  ; 

I  sit  at  oratorios  like  a  fish, 

Incapable  of  sound,  and  only  wish 

The  thing  was  over.     Yet  do  I  admire, 

Oh  tuneful  daughter  of  a  tuneful  sire, 

Thy  painful  labours  in  a  science,  which 

To  your  deserts  I  pray  may  make  you  rich 

As  much  as  you  are  loved,  and  add  a  grace 

To  the  most  musical  Novello  race. 

Women  lead  men  by  the  nose,  some  cynics  say  , 

You  draw  them  by  the  ear — a  delicater  way. 

C.  Lamb. 

He  had  now  to  sustain  the  severest  of  his  losses.  After  a 
long  and  painful  illness,  borne  with  a  heroic  patience,  which 
concealed  the  intensity  of  his  sufferings  from  the  bystanders, 
Coleridge  died.  As  in  the  instance  of  Hazlitt,  Lamb  did  not 
feel  the  immediate  blow  so  acutely  as  he  himself  expected ; 
but  the  calamity  sank  deep  into  his  mind,  and  was,  I  believe, 
seldom  far  from  his  thoughts.  It  had  been  arranged  that  the 
attendance  at  the  funeral  should  be  confined  to  the  family  of 
the  departed  poet  and  philosopher,  and  Lamb,  therefore,  was 
spared  the  misery  of  going  through  the  dismal  ceremony  of 
mourning.  For  the  first  week  he  forbore  to  write  ;  but  at  its 
close  he  addressed  the  following  short  letter  to  one  of  the 


VISIT    TO    HIGHGATE.  307 

family  of  him  whom  he  once  so  justly  denominated  Coleridge's 
"  more  than  friend."  Like  most  of  Lamb's  letters,  it  is  unda- 
ted, but  the  postmark  is  August  5,  1834. 

TO    THE    REV.    JAMES    GILMAN. 

"  My  dear  Sir — The  sad  week  being  over,  T  must  write  to 
you  to  say  that  I  was  glad  of  being  spared  from  attending ; 
I  have  no  words  to  express  my  feeling  with  you  all.  I  can 
only  say  that  when  you  think  a  short  visit  from  me  would  be 
acceptable,  when  your  father  and  mother  shall  be  able  to  see 
me  with  comfort^  I  will  come  to  the  bereaved  house.  Express 
to  them  my  tenderest  regards,  and  hopes  that  they  will  con- 
tinue our  friends  still.  We  both  love  and  respect  them  as 
much  as  a  human  being  can,  and  finally  thank  them  with  our 
hearts  for  what  they  have  been  to  the  poor  departed. 

"  God  bless  you  all. 

"  C.  Lamb. 
"  Mr.  Walden's,  Church-street,  Edmonton." 

Shortly  after,  assured  that  his  presence  would  be  welcome, 
Lamb  went  to  Highgate.  There  he  asked  leave  to  see  the 
nurse  who  had  attended  upon  Coleridge  ;  and  being  struck  and 
affected  by  the  feeling  she  manifested  towards  his  friend,  in- 
sisted on  her  receiving  five  guineas  from  him — a  gratuity 
which  seemed  almost  incomprehensible  to  the  poor  woman, 
but  which  Lamb  could  not  help  giving  as  an  immediate  ex- 
pression of  his  own  gratitude.  From  her  he  learned  the  ef- 
fort by  which  Coleridge  had  suppressed  the  expression  of  his 
sufferings,  and  the  discovery  affected  him  even  more  than  the 
news  of  his  death.  He  would  startle  his  friends  sometimes 
by  suddenly  exclaiming,  "  Coleridge  is  dead !"  and  then  pass 
on  to  common  themes,  having  obtained  the  momentary  relief 
of  oppressed  spirits.  He  still  continued,  however,  his  monthly 
visits  to  Mr.  Carey,  and  was  ready  to  write  an  acrostic  or  a 
complimentary  epigram  at  the  suggestion  of  any  friend.  The 
following  is  the  last  of  his  effusions  in  verse. 

TO  MARGARET  W . 

•  Margaret,  in  happy  hour 
Christen'd  from  that  humble  flower 

Which  wc  a  daisy*  call  ! 
May  thy  pretty  namesake  be 
In  all  thmgs  a  type  of  thee, 

And  image  thee  in  all. 

Like  it  you  show  a  modest  face, 
An  unpretending  native  grace  ; 
The  tulip  and  the  pmk, 

*  Marguerite,  in  French,  signifies  a  daisy. 


308  PRESENT    OF    GAME. 


The  china  and  the  damask  rose, 
And  every  flaunting  flower  that  blows, 
In  the  comparing  shrink. 

Of  lowly  fields  you  think  no  scorn  ; 
Yet  gayest  gardens  would  adorn, 

And  grace,  wherever  set. 
Home-seated  in  your  lonely  bower. 
Or  wedded — a  transplanted  flower — 

I  bless  you,  Margaret ! 

Edmonton,  Oct.  8,  1834. 


Charles  Lamb. 


A  present  of  game  from  an  unknown  admirer  produced  the 
following  acknowledgment  in  the  Athenaeum  of  30th  Novem- 
ber, destined  to  be,  in  sad  verity,  the  last  essay  of  Elia. 

THOUGHTS  ON  PRESENTS  OF  GAME,  &c. 

**  We  love  to  have  our  friend  in  the  country  sitting  thus  at 
our  table  hy  proxy ;  to  apprehend  his  presence  (though  a  hun- 
dred miles  may  be  between  us)  by  a  turkey,  v/hose  goodly  as- 
pect reflects  to  us  his  '  plump  corpusculum  ;'  to  taste  him  in 
grouse  or  woodcock ;  to  feel  him  gliding  down  in  the  toast 
peculiar  to  the  latter ;  to  concorporate  him  in  a  slice  of  Can- 
terbury brawn.  This  is,  indeed,  to  have  him  within  ourselves  ; 
to  know  him  intimately  ;  such  participation  is,  meihinks,  uni- 
tive,  as  the  old  theologians  phrase  it." — Last  Essays  of  Elia. 

"  Elia  presents  his  acknowledgments  to  his  '  Correspondent 
unknown'  for  a  basket  of  prodigiously  fine  game.  He  takes 
for  granted  that  so  amiable  a  character  must  be  a  reader  of  the 
AthencBum,  else  he  had  meditated  a  notice  in  The  Times. 
Now  if  this  friend  had  consulted  the  Delphic  oracle  for  a 
present  suited  to  the  palate  of  Elia,  he  could  not  have  hit  upon 
a  morsel  so  acceptable.  The  birds  he  is  barely  thankful  for; 
pheasants  are  ipooi  fowls  disguised  in  fine  feathers.  But  a 
hare  roasted  hard  and  brown,  with  gravy  and  melted  butter  ! — 
old  Mr.  Chambers,  the  sensible  clergyman  in  Warwickshire, 
whose  son's  acquaintance  has  made  many  hours  happy  in  the 
life  of  Elia,  used  to  allow  a  pound  of  Epping  to  every  hare. 
Perhaps  that  was  overdoing  it.  But,  in  spite  of  the  note  of 
Philomel,  who,  like  some  fine  poets,  that  think  no  scorn  to 
adopt  plagiarisms  from  a  humble  brother,  reiterates  every  spring 
her  cuckoo  cry  of  '  Jug,  Jug,  Jug,'  Elia  pronounces  that  a 
hare,  to  be  truly  palated,  must  be  roasted.  Jugging  sophisti- 
cates her.  In  our  way  it  eats  so  '  crips,'  as  Mrs.  Minikin 
says.  Time  was,  when  Elia  was  not  arrived  at  his  taste,  that 
he  preferred  to  all  luxuries  a  roasted  pig.  But  he  disclaims 
all  such  green-sickness  appetites  in  future,  though  he  hath  to 
acknowledge  the  receipt  of  many  a  delicacy  in  that  kind  from 


PRESENT    OF    GAME.  309 

correspondents — good,  but  mistaken  men — in  consequence  of 
their  erroneous  supposition  that  he  had  carried  up  into  mature 
life  the  prepossessions  of  childhood.  P'rom  the  worthy  Vicar 
of  Enfield  he  acknowledges  a  lithe  contribution  of  extraor- 
dinary sapor.  The  ancients  must  have  loved  hares.  Else 
why  adopt  the  word  lepores  (obviously  from  lepiis)  but  for  some 
subtile  analogy  between  the  delicate  flavour  of  the  latter,  and 
the  finer  relishes  of  wit  in  what  we  most  poorly  translate ^/ea^- 
antries.  The  fine  madnesses  of  the  poet  are  the  very  decoc- 
tion of  his  diet.  Thence  is  he  hare-brained.  Harum-scarum 
is  a  libellous  unfounded  phrase  of  modern  usage.  'Tis  true 
the  hare  is  the  most  circumspect  of  animals,  sleeping  with  her 
eye  open.  Her  ears,  ever  erect,  keep  them  in  that  wholesome 
exercise  which  conduces  them  to  form  the  very  tit-bit  of  the 
admirers  of  this  noble  animal.  Noble  will  I  call  her  in  spite 
of  her  detractors,  who,  from  occasional  demonstration  of  the 
principle  of  self-preservation  (common  to  all  animals),  infer  in 
her  a  defect  of  heroism.  Half  a  hundred  horsemen,  with 
thrice  the  number  of  dogs,  scour  the  country  in  pursuit  of 
puss  across  three  counties  ;  and  because  the  well-flavoured 
beast,  weighing  the  odds,  is  willing  to  evade  the  hue  and  cry, 
with  her  delicate  ears  shrinking  perchance  from  discord  — 
comes  the  grave  naturalist,  Linnaeus  perchance,  or  Buflron,and 
gravely  sets  down  the  hare  as  a — timid  animal.  Why  Achil- 
les or  Bully  Dawson  would  have  declined  the  preposterous 
combat. 

"  In  fact,  how  light  of  digestion  we  feel  after  a  hare  !  How 
tender  its  processes  after  swallowing !  What  chyle  it  pro- 
motes !  How  ethereal  !  as  if  its  living  celerity  were  a  type 
of  its  nimble  coursing  through  the  animal  juices.  The  notice 
might  be  longer.  It  is  intended  less  as  a  Natural  History  of 
the  Hare  than  a  cursory  thanks  to  the  country  '  good  Un- 
known.'    The  hare  has  many  friends,  but  none  sincerer  than 

"  Elia." 

A  short  time  only  before  Lamb's  fatal  illness,  he  yielded  to 
my  urgent  imporiunity,  and  met  a  small  party  of  his  friends  at 
dinner  at  my  house,  where  we  had  j)rovi(l(;d  for  him  some  of 
the  few  articles  of  food  which  now  seemed  to  hit  his  fancy, 
and  among  them  the  hare,  which  had  supplanted  pig  in  his 
just  esteem,  with  the  hope  of  exciting  his  very  delicate  appe- 
tite. We  were  not  disappointed  ;  he  ate  with  a  relish  not 
usual  with  him  of  late  years,  and  passed  the  evening  in  hij 
happiest  moad.  Among  the  four  or  i'we  who  met  him  on  this 
occasion,  the  last  on  which  I  saw  him  in  health,  were  his  old 
friends  Mr.  Barron  Field,  Mr.  Procter,  and   Mr.  Forster,  the 


310  LETTER    TO    GUILDS. 

author  of  the  "  Lives  of  Eminent  English  Statesmen,"  a  friend 
of  comparatively  recent  date,  but  one  with  whom  Lamb  found 
himself  as  much  at  home  as  if  he  had  known  him  for  years. 
Mr.  Field,  in  a  short  but  excellent  memoir  of  Lamb,  in  the 
"  Annual  Biography  and  Obituary"  of  1836,  has  brought  this 
evening  vividly  to  recollection  ;  and  1  have  a  melancholy  satis- 
faction in  quoting  a  passage  from  it  as  he  has  recorded  it. 
After  justly  eulogizing  Lamb's  sense  of  "The  Virtue  of  Sup- 
pression in  Writing,"  Mr.  Field  proceeds  : — 

"  We  remember,  at  the  very  last  supper  we  ate  with  him,  he 
quoted  a  passage  from  Prior's  '  Henry  and  Emma,'  illustrative 
of  this  discipline  ;  and  yet  he  said  that  he  loved  Prior  as  much 
as  any  man,  but  that  his  '  Henry  and  Emma'  was  a  vapid  para- 
phrase of  the  old  poem  of  '  The  Nutbrowne  Mayde.'  For  ex- 
ample, at  the  denouement  o(  the  ballad  Prior  makes  Henry  rant 
out  to  his  devoted  Emma — 

•  In  me  behold  the  potent  Edgar's  heir, 
Illustrious  earl !  him  terrible  in  war. 
Let  Loire  confess,  for  she  has  felt  his  sword, 
And  trembhng  fled  before  the  British  lord.' 

And  so  on  for  a  dozen  couplets,  heroic,  as  they  are  called. 
And  then  Mr.  Lamb  made  us  mark  the  modest  simplicity  with 
which  the  noble  youth  discloses  himself  to  his  mistress  in  the 
old  poem : — 

'  Now,  understand, 
To  Westmoreland, 
Which  is  my  heritage 
(in  a  parenthesis,  as  it  were), 
I  will  you  bring, 
And  with  a  ring, 
By  way  of  marriage, 
I  will  you  take, 
And  lady  make. 
As  shortly  as  I  can. 
So  have  you  won 
An  earless  son, 
And  not  a  vanquish'd  man.' 

*♦  How  he  loved  these  old  rhymes,  and  with  what  justice  !" — 
p.  14,  15. 

In  December  Mr.  Lamb  received  a  letter  from  a  gentleman, 
a  stranger  to  him  — Mr.  Childs,  of  Bungay,  whose  copy  of 
"Elia"  had  been  sent  on  an  oriental  voyage,  and  who,  in  or- 
der to  replace  it,  applied  to  Mr.  Lamb.  The  following  in  his 
reply. 


lamb's  last  illness.  311 


TO    MR.  CHILD. 

**  Monday.     Church-street,  Edmonton  (not  Enfield, 
as  you  erroneously  direct  yours). 

"  Dear  Sir — The  volume  which  you  seem  to  want  is  not  to 
be  had  for  love  or  money.  I  with  difficulty  procured  a  copy 
for  myself.  Yours  is  gone  to  enlighten  the  tawny  Hmdoos. 
What  a  supreme  felicity  to  the  author  (only  he  is  no  traveller) 
on  the  Ganges  or  Hydaspes  (Indian  streams)  to  meet  a  smutty 
Gentoo  reader  to  burst  with  laughing  at  the  tale  of  Bo-Bo  !  for 
doubtless  it  hath  been  translated  into  all  the  dialects  of  the  East. 
I  grieve  the  less  that  Europe  should  want  it.  I  cannot  gather 
from  your  letter  whether  you  are  aware  that  a  second  series 
of  the  Essays  is  published  by  Moxon,  in  Dover-street,  Picca- 
dilly, called  '  The  Last  Essays  of  Elia,'  and,  I  am  told,  is  not 
inferior  to  the  former.  Shall  I  order  a  copy  for  you,  and  will 
you  accept  it  ?  Shall  I  lend  you,  at  the  same  time,  my  sole 
copy  of  the  former  volume  (oh  !  return  it)  for  a  month  or  two  ? 
In  return,  you  shall  favour  me  with  the  loan  of  one  of  those 
Norfolk  grunters  that  you  laud  so  highly ;  1  promise  not  to 
keep  it  above  a  day.  What  a  funny  name  Bungay  is!  I  never 
dreamed  of  a  correspondent  thence.  I  used  to  think  of  it  as 
some  Utopian  town  or  borough  in  Gotham  land.  1  now  be- 
lieve in  its  existence  as  part  of  merry  England.  ' 

[Here  some  lines  are  scratched  out.] 
The  part  I  have  scratched  out  is  the  best  of  the  letter.     Let 
me  have  your  commands. 

Ch.  Lamb  alias  Elia." 

A  few  days  after  this  letter  was  written  an  accident  befell 
Mr.  Lamb,  which  seemed  trifling  at  first,  but  which  terminated 
in  a  fatal  issue.  In  taking  his  daily  morning  walk  on  the 
London  Road  as  far  as  the  inn  where  John  Gilpin's  ride  is 
pictured,  he  stumbled  against  a  stone,  fell,  and  slightly  injured 
his  face.  The  wounds  seemed  healing,  when  erysipelas  in 
the  head  came  on,  and  he  sunk  beneath  the  disease,  happily 
without  pain.  On  Friday  evening  Mr.  Kyle,  of  the  India 
House,  who  had  been  appointed  co-executor  with  me  of  his 
will  some  years  before,  called  on  me,  and  informed  me  that 
he  was  in  danger.  I  went  over  to  Edmonton  on  the  following 
morning,  and  found  him  very  weak,  and  nearly  insensible  to 
things  passing  around  him.  Now  and  then  a  few  words  were 
audible,  from  which  it  seemed  that  his  mind,  in  its  feebleness, 
was  intent  on  kind  and  hospitable  thoughts.  His  last  corre- 
spondent, Mr.  Childs,  had  sent  a  present  of  a  turkey  in- 
stead of  the  suggested  pig  ;    and  the  broken  sentences  which 


312  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

could  be  heard  were  of  some  meeting  of  friends  to  partake 
of  it.  I  do  not  think  he  knew  me  ;  and,  having  vainly  tried 
to  engage  his  attention,  I  left  him,  not  believing  his  death  so 
near  at  hand.  In  less  than  an  hour  afterward  his  voice  grad- 
ually grew  fainter,  as  he  still  murmured  the  names  of  Moxon, 
Procter,  and  some  other  old  friends,  and  he  sank  into  death 
as  placidly  as  into  sleep.  On  the  following  Saturday  his  re- 
mains were  laid  in  a  deep  grave  in  Edmonton  churchyard, 
made  in  a  spot  which,  about  a  fortnight  before,  he  had  pointed 
out  to  his  sister,  on  an  afternoon  wintry  walk,  as  the  place 
where  he  wished  to  be  buried. 

So  died,  in  the  sixtieth  year  of  his  age,  one  of  the  most  re- 
markable and  amiable  men  who  have  ever  lived.  Few  of  his 
numerous  friends  were  aware  of  his  illness  before  they  heard 
of  his  death  ;  and,  until  that  illness  seized  him,  he  had  ap- 
peared so  little  changed  by  time,  so  likely  to  continue  for  sev- 
eral years,  and  he  was  so  intimately  associated  with  every- 
day engagements  and  feelings,  that  the  news  was  as  strange 
as  it  was  mournful.  AVhen  the  first  sad  surprise  was  over, 
several  of  his  friends  strove  to  do  justice  to  their  own  recol- 
lections of  him  ;  and  articles  upon  his  character  and  writings, 
all  written  out  of  the  heart,  appeared  from  Mr.  Procter  in  the 
"  Athenaeum,"  from  Mr.  Forster  in  the  "  New  Monthly  Maga- 
zine," from  Mr.  Patmore  in  the  "  Court  Magazine,"  and  from 
Mr.  Moxon  in  Leigh  Hunt's  London  Journal,  besides  others 
whose  authors  are  unknown  to  me  ;  and  subsequently  many 
affectionate  allusions  from  pens  which  his  own  had  inspired, 
have  been  gleaned  out  in  various  passages  of  "  Blackwood," 
"  Fraser,"  "  Tait,"  and  almost  every  periodical  work  of  repu- 
tation. The  "  Recollections  of  Coleridge,"  by  Mr.  Allsop, 
also  breathed  the  spirit  of  admiration  for  his  elevated  genius, 
which  the  author — one  whom  Lamb  held  in  the  highest  esteem 
for  himself,  and  for  his  devotion  to  Coleridge — had  for  years 
expressed  both  in  his  words  and  in  deeds.  But  it  is  not  pos- 
sible for  the  subtilest  characteristic  power,  even  when  animated 
by  the  warmest  personal  regard,  to  give  to  those  who  never 
had  the  privilege  of  his  companionship  an  idea  of  what  Lamb 
was.  There  was  an  apparent  contradiction  in  him,  which 
seemed  an  inconsistency  between  thoughts  closely  associated, 
and  which  was,  in  reality,  nothing  but  the  contradiction  of  his 
genius  and  his  fortune,  fantastically  exhibiting  itself  in  differ- 
ent aspects,  which  close  intimacy  could  alone  appreciate. 
He  would  startle  you  with  the  finest  perception  of  truth,  sep- 
arating, by  a  phrase,  the  real  from  a  tissue  of  conventional 
falsehoods,  and  the  next  moment,  by  some  whimsical  inven- 
tion, make  you  "  doubt  truth  to  be  a  liar."     He  would  touch 


CHARACTER    OF    J.AMD.  313 

the  inmost  pulse  of  profound  afTection,  and  then  break  off  in 
some  jest,  which  would  seem  profane  "  to  ears  polite,"  but 
carry  as  profound  a  meaning  to  those  whQ  had  the  right  key 
as  his  most  pathetic  suggestions ;  and  where  he  loved  and 
doted  most,  he  would  vent  the  overflowing  of  his  feeling  in 
words  that  looked  like  rudeness.  He  touches  on  this  strange 
resource  of  love  in  his  "  Farewell  to  Tobacco,"  in  a  passage 
which  may  explain  some  startling  freedoms  with  those  he  him- 
self loved  most  dearly. 

"  Irony  all,  and  foign'd  abuse, 
Such  as  perplex'd  lovers  use, 
At  a  need,  when  in  despair. 
To  paint  forth  their  fairest  fair; 
Or  in  part  but  to  express 
That  exceeding  comeliness, 
^Vhich  their  fancies  doth  so  strike 
They  borrow  language  of  dislike  ; 
And,  instead  of  '  dearest  miss,' 
.Te\rel,  honey,  sweetheart,  bliss, 
And  those  forms  of  old  admiring, 
Call  her  cockatrice  and  siren, 
Basilisk,  and  all  that's  evil, 
Witch,  hyena,  mermaid,  devil, 
Ethiop,  vvench,  and  blackamoor, 
Monkey,  ape,  and  twenty  more, 
Friendly  traitress,  loving  foe. 
Not  thai  she  is  truly  so, 
But  no  ol'ier  way  they  linow 
A  contentment  to  express 
Borders  so  upon  excess, 
That  they  do  not  rightly  wot 
Whether  it  be  pain  or  not." 

Thus,  m  the  very  excess  of  affection  to  his  sister,  whom  he 
loved  above  all  else  on  earth,  he  would  sometimes  address  to 
her  some  words  of  seeming  reproach,  yet  so  tinged  with  a 
humorous  irony  that  none  but  an  entire  stranger  could  mistake 
his  drift.  His  anxiety  for  her  health,  even  in  his  most  con- 
vivial moments,  was  unceasing.  If,  in  company,  he  perceived 
she  looked  languid,  he  would  repeatedly  a«k  her,  "  Mary,  does 
vour  head  ache  ?"  "  Don't  you  feel  unwell  f  and  would  be 
satisfied  by  none  of  her  gentle  assurances  that  his  fears  were 
groundless.  He  was  always  afraid  of  her  sensibilities  being 
too  deeply  engaged  ;  and  if  in  her  presence  any  painful  acci- 
dent or  history  was  discussed,  he  would  turn  the  conversation 
with  some  desperate  joke.  Miss  Heetiiam,  the  author  of  the 
"  Lay  of  Marie,"  which  Lamb  esteemed  one  of  the  most 
graceful  and  truly  femiuiiu!  works  in  a  literature  rich  in  fe- 
male genius,  who  has  reminded  me  of  the  trait  in  some  recol- 
lections of  Lamb  with  which  she  has  furnished  me,  relates 
that  once  when  she  was  speaking  to  Miss  liamb  of  Charles, 
and  in  her  earnestness  Miss  Lamb  had  laid  her  hand  kindly 
Vol.  I.— 27  O 


314  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

on  the  eulogist's  shoulder,  he  came  up  hastily  and  interrupted 
them,  saying,  "  Come,  come,  we  must  not  talk  sentimentally," 
and  took  up  the  conversation  in  his  gayest  strain. 

Many  of  Lamb's  witty  and  curious  sayings  have  been  re- 
peated since  his  death,  which  are  worthy  to  be  held  in  undying 
remembrance  ;  but  they  give  no  idea  of  the  general  tenour  of 
his  conversation,  which  was  far  more  singular  and  delightful 
in  the  traits,  which  could  never  be  recalled,  than  in  the  epi- 
grammatic turns  which  it  is  possible  to  quote.  It  was  fretted 
into  perpetual  eddies  of  verbal  felicity  and  happy  thought, 
with  little  tranquil  intervals  reflecting  images  of  exceeding 
elegance  and  grace.  He  sometimes  poured  out  puns  in  start- 
ling succession  ;  sometimes  curiously  contrived  a  train  of  sen- 
tences to  introduce  the  catastrophe  of  a  pun,  which,  in  that 
case,  was  often  startling  from  its  own  demerit.  At  Mr.  Carey's 
one  day  he  introduced  and  kept  up  an  elaborate  dissertation 
on  the  various  uses  and  abuses  of  the  word  nice ;  and,  when 
its  variations  were  exhausted,  showed  what  he  had  been  dri- 
ving at  by  exclaiming,  "  Well !  now  we  have  held  a  Council 
of  Nice."  "A  pun,"  said  he,  in  a  letter  to  Coleridge,  in 
which  he  eulogized  the  Odes  and  Addresses  of  his  friends 
Hood  and  Reynolds,  "  is  a  thing  of  too  much  consequence  to 
be  thrown  in  as  a  makeweight.  You  shall  read  one  of  the 
Addresses  twice  over  and  miss  the  puns,  and  it  shall  be  quite 
as  good,  or  better,  than  when  you  discover  them.  A  pun  is  a 
noble  thing  per  se.  Oh,  never  bring  it  in  as  an  accessary  1 
A  pun  is  a  sole  digest  of  reflection  (vide  my  'Aids'  to  that 
awaking  from  a  savage  state);  it  is  entire;  it  fills  the  mind; 
it  is  as  perfect  as  a  sonnet ;  better.  It  limps  ashamed  in  the 
train  and  retinue  of  humour.  It  knows  it  should  have  an  es- 
tablishment of  its  own.  The  one,  for  instance,  1  made  the 
other  day ;  I  forget  which  it  was."  Indeed,  Lamb's  choicest 
puns  and  humorous  expressions  could  not  be  recollected. 
They  were  born  of  the  evanescent  feeling,  and  died  with  it ; 
"  one  moment  bright^  then  gone  for  ever."  The  shocks  of 
pleasurable  surprise  were  so  rapid  in  succession,  and  the 
thoughts  suggested  so  new,  that  one  destroyed  the  other,  and 
left  only  the  sense  of  delight  behind.  Frequently  as  I  had 
the  happiness  of  seeing  him  during  twenty  years,  I  can  add 
nothing  from  my  own  store  of  recollection  to  those  which 
have  been  collected  by  others,  and  those  I  almost  hesitate  to 
repeat,  so  vapid  is  their  effect  when  printed  compared  to  that 
which  they  produced  when,  stammered  out,  they  gave  to  the 
moment  its  victory.* 

*  Miss  Beetham  has  kindly  supplied  the  following  examples  of  his  conver- 
•ation  : — A  Miss  Pate  (when  he  heard  of  her,  he  asked  if  she  was  any  rela- 


CHARACTER    OF    LAMB.  315 

It  cannot  be  denied  or  concealed  that  Lamb's  excellences, 
moral  and  intellectual,  were  blended  with  a  single  frailty  ;  so 
intimately  associating  itself  with  all  that  was  most  charming 

tion  to  Mr.  John  Head  of  Ipswich)  was  at  a  party,  and  he  said  on  hearing  her 
name,  "  Miss  Pate  1  hate."  "  You  are  the  first  person  who  ever  told  nie  so, 
however,"  said  she.  "  Oh  !  I  mean  nothing  by  it.  If  it  had  been  M  iss  Dove,  I 
should  have  said,  Miss  Dove  I  love  ;  or  Miss  Pike  I  like."  About  this  time 
also  I  saw  Mr.  Hazlitt  for  the  first  time  at  their  house,  and  was  talking  on 
metaphysical  subjects  with  him.  Mr.  Lamb  came  up  ;  but  my  companion 
was  very  eloquent,  and  I  begged  him  not  to  interrupt  us.  He  stood  silent, 
and  Mr.  Dyer  came  to  me.  "  I  know,"  said  he,  "that  Mr.  Cristall  is  a  very 
fine  artist,  but  I  should  like  to  know  in  what  his  merit  principally  consists.  Is 
it  colouring,  character,  design,  &c.  ?  my  eyes  are  so  bad  !"  On  which  Mr. 
Lamb  began  rhyming — 

"  Says  Mr.  Dyer  to  Mr.  Dawe, 
Pray  how  does  Mr.  Cristall  draw? 
Says  Mr.  Dawe  to  Mr.  Dyer, 
He  draws  as  well  as  you'd  desire." 

A  lady  he  was  intimate  with  had  dark  eyes,  and  one  evening  people  rather 
persecuted  him  to  praise  them.  "  You  should  now  write  a  couplet  in  praise 
of  her  eyes."  "  Ay,  do,  Mr.  Lamb,"  said  she,  "  make  an  epigram  about  my 
eyes."    He  looked  at  her — 

"  Your  eyes  !  your  eyes ! 
Are  both  of  a  size  !" 

which  was  praise,  but  the  least  that  could  be  accorded.  Mrs.  S recom- 
mended honey  to  him  as  a  good  thing  for  the  eyes,  and  said  her  daughter  had 
received  much  benefit  from  it.  "  I  knew,"  said  he,  "  she  had  sweet  eyes,  but 
had  no  idea  before  how  they  became  so." 

At  my  house  once  a  person  said  something  about  his  grandmother.  "  Was 
she  a  tall  woman?"  said  Lamb.  "I  don't  know;  no.  Why  do  you  ask?" 
"  Oh,  mine  was  ;  she  was  a  «ranny  dear."  He  asked  an  absent  lady's  name 
who  had  rather  sharp  features.  On  hearing  it  was  Elizabeth,  or  something 
of  the  kind,  he  said,  "  I  should  have  thought,  if  it  had  been  Mary,  she  might 
have  been  St.  Mary  Axe."  Another,  who  was  very  much  marked  with  the 
smallpox,  he  said,  looked  as  if  the  devil  had  ridden  roughshod  over  her  face. 
I  saw  him  talking  to  her  afterward  with  great  apparent  interest,  and  noticed  it, 
saying,  "  I  thought  he  had  not  liked  her."  His  reply  was,  "I  like  her  inter- 
nals very  well."  When  I  knew  hiin  first,  I  happened  to  sit  next  hiin  at  dinner, 
and  he  was  running  on  about  some  lady  who  had  died  of  love  for  hiin,  saying, 
*'  he  was  very  sorry."  but  we  could  not  command  such  inclinations  ;  making  all 
the  commonplace  stuff  said  on  such  occasions  appear  very  ridiculous,  his  sis- 
ter laughingly  interrupting  him  now  and  then  by  saying.  "  Why,  slie's  alive 
now  !"  "  Why,  she's  married,  and  has  a  large  family,"  &c.  He  would  not, 
however,  allow  it,  and  went  on.  With  a  very  serious  fare,  therefore,  when 
he  looked  my  way,  I  said,  "  An<l  did  she  really  die?"  With  a  look  of  indig- 
nant astonishment  at  my  sim|ili<'ity.  he  said,  "  And  do  you  think  1  should  V 
Not  being  able  to  supjiress  a  smile,  he  saw  what  I  had  been  about  ;  and,  with- 
out finishing  his  speech,  tiirncfl  away  his  head.  The  way  in  which  he  would 
imitate  a  jierson  who  had  been  detected  in  .some  petty  theft  was  inimitable. 
He  began  once  by  saying  he  never  had  been  in  suspicious  cirniinstances  |)iii 
once,  and  then  he  had  his  hand  over  a  pninca  that  lay  on  a  counter,  hut  that  he 
really  did  not  know  it  was  there,  tStc.  My  youngest  sister,  then  a  little  girl, 
in  her  talk  afterward,  seemed  to  think  he  must  have  known  it 

Mrs.  H was  silting  on  a  sofa  one  day  between  Mr.  .Montngne  and  Mr. 

Lamb.  The  latter  spoke  to  her,  but  all  her  attention  was  jziven  to  the  other 
party.  At  last  they  ceased  talking,  and,  turning  round  to  Mr.  liamh.she  asked 
what  it  was  he  had  been  saying.  He  replied,  "  Ask  Mr.  Montague,  for  it  went 
in  at  one  ear  and  out  at  another." 

02 


316  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

in  the  one  and  sweetest  in  the  other,  that,  even  if  it  were  right 
to  withdraw  it  wholly  from  notice,  it  would  be  impossible 
without  it  to  do  justice  to  his  virtues.  The  eagerness  with 
which  he  would  quaff  exciting  liquors  from  an  early  period 
of  life,  proved  that  to  a  physical  peculiarity  of  constitution 

One  day,  at  the  exhibition  of  the  Royal  Academy,  I  was  sitting  on  a  form, 
lookmg  at  the  catah^gue,  and  answering  some  young  people  about  ine  who 
had  none,  or  spared  themselves  the  trouble  of  consulting  it.  There  was  a 
large  picture  of  Prospero  and  Miranda  ;  and  I  had  just  said,  "  It  is  by  Shee  ;'' 
when  a  voice  near  me  said,  "  Would  it  not  be  more  grammatical  to  say  by 
her?"     I  looked,  it  was  Mr.  Lamb. 

He  went  with  a  party  down  to  my  brother  Charles's  ship,  in  which  the  of- 
ficers gave  a  ball  to  their  friends.  My  brother  hired  a  vessel  to  take  us  down 
to  it,  and  some  one  of  the  company  asked  its  name.  On  hearing  it  was  the 
Antelope,  Mr.  Lamb  cried  out,  "  Don't  name  it ;  I  have^uch  a  respect  for  my 
aunt,  I  cannot  bear  to  think  of  her  doing  such  a  foolish  action  !" 

I  once  sat  with  Mr.  Lamb  in  the  pit  of  the  theatre  when  Mrs.  Siddons  gave 
one  of  her  last  performances.  We  had  two  vulgar  and  conceited  women  be- 
hind us,  who  went  on  explaining  and  commenting,  to  show  their  knowledge, 
in  a  most  absurd  manner.  Mr.  Lamb  occasionally  gave  them  a  lift.  When 
Malcom  came  on,  he  said,  " //e  a  king!  why  he  is  in  petticoats!"  One  of 
them  said  to  the  other,  "  It's  the  dress  of  the  country.  Ignorant  wretches!" 
/had,  I  believe,  once  led  the  discourse  in  company,  by  telling  a  story  of  a  bad 
Arabian  poet,  who  fell  sick  because  he  could  get  nobody  to  hear  him  recite  : 
the  physician  grasped  the  cane  and  caned  him.  On  this  Mr.  Lamb  declaimed  a 
great  deal  against  the  absurdity  of  reading  one's  own  works  aloud  ;  that  peo- 
ple were  always  tired  instead  of  being  pleased  with  it;  and  that  he  made  a 
poem  the  other  day,  befitting  the  time  (one  of  those  of  overwhelming  darkness, 
such  as  ours  in  London  sometimes  are) ;  and  though  he  had  not  yet  had  time 
to  transcribe  it,  and  recollected  it  perfectly,  he  should  never  think  of  repeat- 
ing it  to  other  people.  Everybody,  of  course,  were  entreating  him  to  favour 
them  by  repeating  it,  assuring  him  they  should  like  it  very  much  ;  and  at  length 
he  complied.     "Oh  my  Gog  !  what  a  fog  !"     "A  fine  thing  to  make  a  fuss 

about!"  said  Miss  M ;  "  why,  I  can  make  a  second  part  extempore — 1 

cannot  see  to  kill  a  flea  !" 

A  lady  who  had  been  visiting  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Ipswich,  on  her  re- 
turn could  talk  of  nothing  but  the  beauty  of  the  country  and  the  merits  of  the 
people.     Mr.  Lamb  remarked  that  "  she  was  Suffolk-ated." 

The  following  specimens  of  his  conversation  have  been  supplied  by  another 
friend. 

A  widow-friend  of  Lamb  having  opened  a  preparatory  school  for  children  at 
Camden  Town,  said  to  him,  "  I  live  so  far  from  town  I  must  have  a  sign,  I 
think  you  call  it,  to  show  that  I  leach  children."  "  Well,"  he  replied,  "  you 
can  have  nothing  better  than  '  The  Murder  of  the  Tnnoceyits.'' " 

A  gentleman  who  had  lived  some  years  in  China  mentioned  that  a  formidable 
enemy  to  the  Cliinese  would  arise  one  day  in  a  warlike  piratical  nation  on  the 
borders  of  China— //(p  Ladro7i.es.  In  the  course  of  the  evening  the  progress  of 
musical  science  in  China  was  spoken  of,  and  the  traveller,  by  way  of  illustra- 
ting his  remarks,  sung  a  Chinese  love-song.  Lamb  listened  very  gravely  to 
this  dissonant  performance,  and  at  the  end  exclaimed,  "  God  prosper  the  La- 
drones  /" 

Coleridge  one  day  said  to  him,  "  Charles,  did  you  ever  hear  me  preach?** 
"Lnever  heard  you  do  anything  else,"  said  Lamb. 

y  Seeing  a  little  boy  heavily  laden  with  groceries  toiling  up  Highgate  Hill 
one  hot  summer's  day,  Lamb  offered  to  assist  him  ;  took  his  load  ;  and  car- 
ried it  for  him  to  the  house  where  the  child  was  to  deliver  it.  On  laying  down 
his  burden,  Lamb  requested  the  lady  of  the  house  to  remonstrate  with  her 
grocer  on  the  inhumanity  of  compelling  such  a  little  boy  to  carry  such  a  load. 
The  lady  bristled  up,  and  sharply  replied,  "  I  have  nothing  to  do  with  such 
matters ;"  on  which  Lamb,  altering  his  tone,  irresistibly  said,  "  I  hope,  ma'am, 
you'll  give  me  a  drop  of  beer." 


CHARACTER    OF    LAMB.  317 

was  to  be  ascribed,  in  the  first  instance,  the  strength  of  the 
temptation  with  which  he  was  assailed.  This  kind  of  cor- 
poreal need  ;  tlie  struggles  of  deep  thought  to  overcome  the 
bashfulness  and  the  impediment  of  speech  which  obstructed 
its  utterance  ;  the  dull,  heavy,  irksome  labours  which  hung 
heavy  on  his  mornings,  and  dried  up  his  spirits  ;  and,  still 
more,  the  sorrows  which  had  environed  him,  and  which 
prompted  him  to  snatch  a  fearful  joy  ;  and  the  unbounded 
craving  after  sympathy  w^ith  human  feelings,  conspired  to  dis- 
arm his  power  of  resisting  when  the  means  of  indulgence  were 
actually  before  him.  Great  exaggerations  have  been  preva- 
lent on  this  subject,  countenanced,  no  doubt,  by  the  "  Con-- 
fessions"  which,  in  the  prodigality  of  his  kindness,  he  contrib-i 
uted  to  his  friend's  collection  of  essays  and  authorities  against) 
the  use  of  spirituous  liquors  ;  for,  although  he  had  rarely  the 
power  to  overcome  the  temptation  when  presented,  he  made 
heroic  sacrifices  in  flight.  His  final  abandonment  of  tobacco, 
after  many  ineffectual  attempts,  was  one  of  these — a  princely 
sacrifice.  He  had  loved  smoking,  "  not  wisely,  but  too  well," 
for  he  had  been  content  to  use  the  coarsest  varieties  of  the 
"great  plant."  When  Dr.  Parr — who  took  only  the  finest  to- 
bacco, used  to  half  fill  his  pipe  with  salt,  and  smoked  with  a 
philosophic  calmness^saw  Lamb  smoking  the  strongest  prep- 
aration of  the  weed,  pufhng  out  smoke  like  some  furious  en- 
chanter, he  gently  laid  down  his  pipe,  and  asked  him  how 
he  had  acquired  his  power  of  smoking  at  such  a  rate.  Lamb 
replied,  "  I  toiled  after  it,  sir,  as  some  men  toil  after  virtue." 
Partly  to  shun  the  temptations  of  society,  and  partly  to  pre- 
serve his  sister's  health,  he  fled  from  London,  where  his 
pleasures  and  his  heart  were,  and  buried  himself  in  the  soli- 
tude of  the  country,  to  him  always  dismal.  He  would  even 
deny  himself  the  gratification  of  meeting  Wordsworth  or 
Southey,  or  use  it  very  sparingly  during  their  visits  to  Lon- 
don, in  order  that  the  accompaniments  of  the  table  might  not 
entice  him  lo  excess.  And  if  somotimos,  after  mih^s  of  soli- 
tary communing  with  his  own  sad  thoughts,  the  village  inn 
did  invite  him  to  quaff  a  glass  of  sparkling  ale  ;  and  if,  when 
his  retreat  was  lighted  up  with  the  presence  of  some  old 
friend,  he  was  unable  to  refrain  from  th»;  small  jiotion  which 
was  too  much  for  his  feeble  frame,  let  not  the  stoiil-limhcd 
and  the  happy  exult  over  the  consequence!  Drinking  with 
him,  except  so  far  as  it  cooled  a  fcvorisii  thirst,  was  not  a 
sensual,  but  an  intellectual  pleasure  ;  it  liiihted  up  his  fading 
fancy,  enriched  his  humour,  and  impelled  the  struggling 
thought  or  beautiful  image  into  day  ;  and,  p<Thaiis,hy  requiring 
for  him  some  portion  of  that  allowance  which  he  extended  to 
27* 


318  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

all  human  frailities,  endeared  him  the  more  to  those  who  so 
often  received,  and  were  delighted  to  bestow  it. 

Lamb's  indulgence  to  the  failings  of  others  could  hardly,  in- 
deed, be  termed  allowance  ;  the  name  of  charity  is  too  cold 
to  suit  it.  He  did  not  merely  love  his  friends  in  spite  of  their 
errors,  but  he  loved  them  errors  and  all ;  so  near  to  him  was 
everything  human.  He  numbered  among  his  associates  men 
of  all  varieties  of  opinion — philosophical,  religious,  and  polit- 
ical— and  found  something  to  like,  not  only  in  the  men  them- 
selves, but  in  themselves  as  associated  with  their  theories  and 
their  schemes.  In  the  high  and  calm,  but  devious  specula- 
tions of  Godwin  ;  in  the  fierce  hatreds  of  Hazlitt ;  in  the  gen- 
tle and  glorious  mysticism  of  Coleridge  ;  in  the  sturdy  oppo- 
sition of  Thelwall  to  the  government ;  in  Leigh  Hunt's  soft- 
ened and  fancy-streaked  patriotism  ;  in  the  gallant  toryism  of 
Stoddart ;  he  found  traits  which  made  the  individuals  more 
dear  to  him.  When  Leigh  Hunt  was  imprisoned  in  Cold  Bath 
Fields  for  a  libel,  Lamb  was  one  of  his  most  constant  visiters 
— and  when  Thelwall  was  striving  to  bring  the  "  Champion" 
into  notice,  Lamb  was  ready  to  assist  him  with  his  pen,  and 
to  fancy  himself,  for  the  time,  a  Jacobin.*  In  this  large  intel- 
lectual tolerance  he  resembled  Professor  Wilson,  who,  not- 
withstanding his  own  decided  opinions,  has  a  compass  of  mind 
large  enough  to  embrace  all  others  which  have  noble  alliances 

*  The  following  little  poem — quite  out  of  Lamb's  usual  style — was  written 
'or  that  journal. 

THE  THREE  GRAVES. 

Close  by  the  ever-burning  brimstone  beds, 
Where  Bedloe,  Gates,  and  Judas  hide  their  heads, 
I  saw  great  Satan,  like  a  sexton  stand, 
With  his  intolerable  spade  in  hand, 
Digging  three  graves.     Of  coffin  shape  they  were, 
For  those  who,  coffinless,  must  enter  there, 
With  unbless'd  rites.     The  shrouds  were  of  that  cloth 
Which  Clotho  weaved  in  her  blackest  wrath  ; 
The  dismal  tint  oppress'd  the  eye  that  dwelt 
Upon  it  long,  like  darkness  to  be  felt. 
The  pillows  to  these  baleful  beds  were  toads. 
Large,  living,  livid,  melancholy  loads. 
Whose  softness  shock'd.     Worms  of  all  monstrous  size 
Crawl'd  round  ;  and  one  upcoil'd,  which  never  dies, 
A  doleful  bell,  inculcating  despair. 
Was  always  ringing  in  the  heavy  air. 
And  all  around  the  detestable  pit 
Strange  headless  ghosts  and  quarter'd  forms  did  flit ; 
Rivers  of  blood  from  living  traitors  spilt. 
By  treachery  slung  from  poverty  to  guilt. 
I  ask'd  the  fiend  for  whom  those  rites  were  meant ; 
"  These  graves,"  quoth  he,  "  when  life's  brief  oil  is  spent, 
When  the  dark  night  comes,  and  they're  sinking  bedwards, 
I  mean  for  Castles,  Oliver,  and  Edwards." 


CHARACTER    OF    LAMB.  319 

within  its  range.*  But  not  only  to  opposite  opinions  and  de- 
vious habits  of  thought  was  Lamb  indulgent  ;  he  discovered 
"  the  soul  of  goodness  in  things  evil"  so  vividly,  that  the  sur- 
rounding evil  dissappeared  from  his  mental  vision.  Nothing 
— no  discovery  of  error  or  of  crime — could  divorce  his  sym- 
pathy from  a  man  who  had  once  engaged  it.  He  saw  in  the 
spendthrift,  the  outcast,  only  the  innocent  companion  of  his 
schooldays  or  the  joyous  associate  of  his  convivial  hours,  and 
he  did  not  even  make  penitence  or  reform  a  condition  of  his 
regard.  Perhaps  he  had  less  sympathy  with  philanthropic 
schemers  for  the  improvement  of  the  world  than  with  any 
other  class  of  men  ;  but  of  these  he  numbered  two  of  the 
greatest,  Clarkson,  the  destroyer  of  the  slave  trade,  and  Basil 
Montague,  the  constant  opponent  of  the  judicial  infliction  of 
death  ;   and  the  labours  of  neither  have  been  in  vain  ! 

To  those  who  were  not  intimately  acquainted  with  I^amb, 
the  strong  disinclination  to  contemplate  another  state  of  being, 
which  he  sometimes  expressed  in  his  serious  conversation, 
and  which  he  has  solemnly  confessed  in  his  "  Newyear's 
Eve,"  might  cast  a  doubt  on  feelings  which  were  essentially 
pious.  The  same  peculiarity  of  nature  which  attached  him 
to  the  narro\v~and  crowded  streets,  in  preference  to  the 
mountain  and  the  glen — which  made  him  loath  to  leave  even 
painful  circumstances  and  unpleasant  or  ill-timed  company ; 
the  desire  to  seize  and  grasp  all  that  was  nearest,  bound  him 
to  earth,  and  prompted  his  sympathies  to  revolve  within  a  nar- 
row circle.  Yet  in  that  very  power  of  adhesion  to  outward 
things  might  be  discerned  the  strength  of  a  spirit  destined  to 
live  beyond  them.  Within  the  contracted  sphere  of  his  habits 
and  desires  he  detected  the  subtilest  essences  of  Christian 
kindliness,  shed  over  it  a  light  from  heaven,  and  peopled  it 
with  divine  fancies  and 

"  Thoughts  whose  very  sweetness  yieldeth  proof 
That  they  were  born  for  immortahty." 

Although  he  numbered  among  his  associates  freethinkers 
and  skeptics,  he  had  a  great  dislike  to  any  profane  handling 
of  sacred  subjects,  and  always  discouraged  polemical  dis- 
cussion. One  evening,  when  Irving  and  Coleridge  were  in 
company,  and  a  young  gentleman  had  spoken  slightingly  of 
religion,  Lamb  remained  silent ;  but,  when   the  party  broke 

*  Lamb  only  once  met  that  remarkable  person — who  has,  probably,  more 
points  of  resemblance  to  him  than  any  other  livnig  poet — and  was  quite 
charmed  with  him.  They  walked  oilt  from  Enfield  together,  and  strolled 
happily  a  long  summer's  day,  not  omitting,  however,  a  rail  for  a  refreshing 
draught.  Lamb  called  for  a  pot  of  ale  or  jiorter— liallOf  which  wouM  have 
been  his  own  usual  allowance  ;  and  was  delighted  to  hear  the  j)rofessor,  on 
the  appearance  of  the  foaming  tankard„say  reproachfully  to  the  waiter,  "And 
one  for  me  !" 


320  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

up,  he  said  to  the  youth  who  had  thus  annoyed  his  guests, 
"  Pray,  did  you  come  here  in  a  hat,  sir,  or  in  a  turban  ?" 

The  range  of  Lamb's  reading  was  varied,  but  yet  peculiar. 
He  rejoiced  in  all  old  English  authors,  but  cared  little  for 
the  moderns,  except  one  or  two ;  and  those  whom  he  loved 
as  authors  because  they  were  his  friends.  Attached  always 
to  things  of  flesh  and  blood  rather  than  to  "  the  bare  earth 
and  mountains  bare,  and  grass  in  the  green  field,"  he  chiefly 
loved  the  great  dramatists,  whose  beauties  he  supported,  and 
sometimes  heightened,  in  his  suggestive  criticisms.  While 
he  enjoyed  Wordsworth's  poetry,  especially  "  The  Excursion," 
with  a  love  which  grew  upon  him  from  his  youth,  he  would 
repeat  some  of  Pope's  divine  compliments  or  Dryden's  lines, 
weighty  with  sterling  sense  or  tremendous  force  of  satire, 
with  eyes  trembling  into  tears.  The  comedies  of  Wycherley, 
and  Congreve,  and  Farquhar,  were  not  to  him  gross  and  sen- 
sual, but  airy,  delicate  creations,  framed  out  of  coarse  mate- 
rials it  might  be,  but  evaporating  in  wit  and  grace,  harmless 
effusions  of  the  intellect  and  the  fancy.  The  ponderous  dul- 
ness  of  old  controversialists,  the  dead  weight  of  volumes  of 
once  fierce  dispute,  of  which  time  had  exhausted  the  venom, 
did  not  appal  him.  He  liked  the  massive  reading  of  the  old 
Quaker  records,  the  huge  density  of  old  schoolmen,  better 
than  the  flippancy  of  modern  criticism.  If  you  spoke  of  Lord 
Byron,  he  would  turn  the  subject  by  quoting  the  lines  de- 
scriptive of  his  namesake  in  Love's  Lahour^s  Lost — "  Oft  have 
I  heard  of  you,  my  Lord  Byron,"  &;c. — for  he  could  find 
nothing  to  revere  or  love  in  poetry  of  that  extraordinary  but 
most  uncomfortable  poet,  except  the  apostrophe  to  Parnassus, 
in  which  he  exults  in  the  sight  of  the  real  mountain  instead 
of  the  mere  poetic  image.  All  the  Laras,  and  Giaours,  and 
Childe  Harolds  were  to  him  but  "  unreal  mockeries" — the 
phantasms  of  a  feverish  dream — forms  which  did  not  appeal 
to  the  sympathies  of  mankind,  and  never  can  find  root  among 
them.  Shelley's  poetry,  too,  was  icy  cold  to  him  ;  except  one 
or  two  of  the  minor  poems,  in  which  he  could  not  help  admi- 
ring the  exquisite  beauty  of  the  expression  ;  and  the  "  Cenci," 
in  which,  notwithstanding  the  painful  nature  of  the  subject, 
there  is  a  warmth  and  passion,  and  a  correspondent  simplicity 
of  diction,  which  prove  how  mighty  a  poet  the  author  would 
have  become  had  he  lived  long  enough  for  his  feelings  to  have 
free  discourse  with  his  creative  power.  Responding  only  to 
the  touch  of  human  affection,  he  could  not  bear  poetry  which, 
instead  of  making  the  whole  world  kin,  renders  our  own  pas- 
sions, and  frailties,  and  virtues  strange  to  us ;  presents  them 
at  distance  in  splendid  masquei;^de  ;  exalts  them  into  new  and 


CHARACTER    OF    LAMB.  33.1 

unauthorized  mythology,  and  crystallizes  all  our  freshest  loves 
and  mantling  joys  into  clusters  of  radiant  fancies.  He  made 
some  amends  for  his  indiflerence  to  Shelley  by  his  admiration 
of  Mrs.  Shelley's  "  Frankenstein,"  which  he  thought  the  most 
extraordinary  realization  of  the  idea  of  a  being  out  of  nature 
which  had  ever  been  effected.  For  the  Scotch  novels  he  cared 
very  little,  not  caring  to  be  puzzled  with  new  plots,  and  pre- 
ferring to  read  Fielding,  and  Smollett,  and  Richardson,  whose 
stories  were  familiar,  over  and  over  again,  to  being  worried 
with  the  task  of  threading  the  maze  of  fresh  adventure.  But 
the  good-naturedness  of  Sir  Walter  to  all  his  contemporaries 
won  his  admiration,  and  he  heartily  rejoiced  in  the  greatness 
of  his  fame  and  the  rich  rewards  showered  upon  him,  and  de- 
sired they  might  accumulate  for  the  glory  of  literature  and  the 
triumph  of  kindness.  He  was  never  introduced  to  Sir  Walter  ; 
but  he  used  to  speak  with  gratitude  and  pleasure  of  the  cir- 
cumstances under  which  he  saw  him  once  in  Fleet-street.  A 
man,  in  the  dress  of  a  mechanic,  stopped  him  just  at  Inner 
Temple-gate,  and  said,  touching  his  hat,  "  I  beg  your  pardon, 
sir,  but  perhaps  you  would  like  to  see  Sir  Walter  Scott ;  that 
is  he  just  crossing  the  road ;"  and  Lamb  stammered  out  his 
hearty  thanks  to  his  truly  humane  informer. 

Of  his  own  writings  it  is  now  superfluous  to  speak  ;  for,  af- 
ter having  encountered  long  derision  and  neglect,  they  have 
taken  their  place  among  the  classics  of  his  language.  They 
stand  alone,  at  once  singular  and  delightful.  They  are  all 
carefully  elaborated ;  yet  never  were  works  written  in  higher 
defiance  to  the  conventional  pomp  of  style.  A  sly  hit,  a  happy 
pun,  a  humorous  combination,  lets  the  light  into  the  intricacies 
of  the  subject,  and  supplies  the  place  of  ponderous  sentences. 
As  his  serious  conversation  was  his  best,  so  his  serious  wri- 
ting is  far  preferable  to  his  fantastical  humours — cheering  as 
they  are,  and  suggestive  ever  as  they  are  of  high  and  invigo- 
rating thoughts.  Seeking  his  materials,  for  the  most  part,  in 
the  common  paths  of  life — often  in  the  humblest — he  gives  an 
importance  to  everything,  and  sheds  a  grace  over  all.  The 
spirit  of  gentility  seems  to  breathe  around  all  his  persons  ;  he 
detects  the  venerable  and  the  excellent  in  the  narrowest  cir- 
cumstances and  humblest  conditions,  with  the  same  subtilty 
which  reveals  the  hidden  soul  of  the  greatest  works  of  genius. 
In  all  things  he  is  most  human.  Of  all  modern  writers,  his 
works  are  most  immediately  directed  to  give  us  heart-ease 
and  to  make  us  happy. 

Among  the  felicities  of  Lamb's  checkered  life,  that  which 
he  esteemed  most  was  his  intimate  friendship  with  some  of 

()  :j 


322  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

the  greatest  of  our  poets — Coleridge,  Southey,  and  Words- 
worth ;  the  last  and  greatest  of  whom  has  paid  a  tribute  to 
his  memory  which  may  fitly  close  this  sketch  of  his  life. 

"  To  a  good  man  of  most  dear  memory 
This  stone  is  sacred.     Here  he  lies  apart 
From  that  great  city  where  he  first  drew  breath, 
Was  reared  and  taught ;  and  humbly  earned  his  bread, 
To  the  strict  labours  of  the  merchant's  desk 
By  duty  chained.     Not  seldom  did  those  tasks 
Teaze,  and  the  thought  of  time  so  spent  depress 
His  spirit,  but  the  recompense  was  high  ; 
Firm  Independence,  Bounty's  rightful  sire ; 
Affections,  warm  as  sunshine,  free  as  air ;  ^ 

And  when  the  precious  hours  of  leisure  came,  " 
Knowledge  and  wisdom,  gained  from  converse  sweet 
With  books,  or  while  he  ranged  the  crowded  streets 
With  a  keen  eye  and  overflowmg  heart : 
So  genius  triumphed  over  seeming  wrong, 
And  poured  out  truth  in  works  by  thoughtful  love 
Inspired — works  potent  over  smiles  and  tears. 
And  as  round  mountain-tops  the  lightning  plays, 
Thus  innocently  sported,  breaking  forth 
As  from  a  cloud  of  some  grave  sympathy. 
Humour,  and  wild  instinctive  wit,  and  all 
The  vivid  flashes  of  his  spoken  words. 
From  the  most  gentle  creature  nursed  in  fields 
Had  been  derived  the  name  he  bore — a  name, 
Wherever  Christian  altars  have  been  raised, 
Hallowed  to  meekness  and  to  innocence ; 
And  if  in  him  meekness  at  times  gave  way, 
Provoked  out  of  herself  by  troubles  strange. 
Many  and  strange,  that  hung  about  his  life  ; 
Still,  at  the  centre  of  his  being,  lodged 
A  soul  by  resignation  sanctified  : 
And  if  too  often,  self-reproached,  he  felt 
That  innocence  belongs  not  to  our  kind, 
A  power  that  never  ceased  to  abide  in  him. 
Charity,  mid  the  multitude  of  sins 
That  she  can  cover,  left  not  his  exposed 
To  an  unforgiving  judgment  from  just  Heaven. 
Oh,  he  was  good,  if  e'er  a  good  man  lived  ! 
***** 

From  a  reflecting  mind  and  sorrowing  heart 

Those  simple  lines  flowed  with  an  earnest  wish. 

Though  but  a  doubting  hope,  that  they  might  serve 

Fitly  to  guard  the  precious  dust  of  him 

Whose  virtues  called  them  forth.    That  aim  is  missed ; 

For  much  that  truth  most  urgently  required 

Had  from  a  faltering  pen  been  asked  in  vain : 

Yet,  haply,  on  the  printed  page  received. 

The  imperfect  record,  there,  may  stand  unblamed 

As  long  as  verse  of  mine  shall  breathe  the  air 

Of  memory,  or  see  the  light  of  love. 

Thou  wert  a  scorner  of  the  fields,  my  friend  ! 
But  more  in  show  than  truth  !  and  liom  the  fields 
And  from  the  mountains,  to  thy  rural  grave 
Transported,  my  soothed  spirit  hovers  o'er 
Its  green  untrodden  turf  and  blowing  flowers  ; 
And,  taking  up  a  voice,  shall  speak  (though  still 
Awed  by  the  theme's  peculiar  sanctity. 
Which  words  less  free  presumed  not  even  to  touch) 
Of  that  fraternal  love,  whose  heaven-lit  lamp 


CHARACTER    OF    LAMB.  323 

From  infancy,  through  manhood,  to  the  last 
Of  threescore  years,  and  to  thy  latest  hour, 
Burnt  on  with  ever-strengthening  hght,  enshrined 
Within  thy  bosom. 

'  Wonderful'  hath  been 
The  love  estabhshed  between  man  and  man, 
'  Passing  the  love  of  women  ;'  and  between 
Man  and  his  helpmate  in  fast  wedlock  joined 
Through  God,  is  raised  a  spirit  and  soul  of  love, 
Without  whose  blissful  influence  Paradise 
Had  been  no  Paradise ;  and  earth  were  now 
A  waste,  where  creatures  bearing  human  form, 
Direst  of  savage  beasts,  would  roam  in  fear. 
Joyless  and  comfortless.     Our  days  glide  on ; 
And  let  him  grieve  who  cannot  choose  but  grieve 
I'hat  he  hath  been  an  Elm  without  his  Vine, 
And  her  bright  dower  of  clustering  charities, 
That,  round  his  trunk  and  branches,  might  have  clung 
Enriching  and  adorning.     Unto  thee 
Not  so  enriched,  not  so  adorned,  to  thee 
Was  given  (say  rather  thou  of  later  birth 
Wert  given  to  her)  a  sister — 'tis  a  word 
Timidly  uttered,  for  she  lives,  the  meek, 
The  self-restraining,  and  the  ever-kind ; 
In  whom  thy  reason  and  inteUigent  heart 
Found — for  all  interests,  hopes,  and  tender  cares, 
All  softening,  humanizing,  hallowing  powers, 
Whether  withheld,  or  for  her  sake  unsought — 
More  than  sufficient  recompense  ! 

Her  love 
(What  weakness  prompts  the  voice  to  tell  it  here?) 
Was  as  the  love  of  mothers  ;  and  when  years, 
Lifting  the  boy  to  man's  estate,  had  called 
The  long-protected  to  assume  the  part 
Of  a  protector,  the  first  filial  tie 
Wis  undissolved  ;  and,  in  or  out  of  sight, 
Remained  imperishably  interwoven 
With  life  itself.     Thus,  mid  a  shifting  world, 
Did  they  together  testify  of  time 
And  seasons'  difference — a  double  tree 
With  two  collateral  stems  sprung  from  one  root ; 
Such  were  they — such  through  life  they  might  have  been 
In  union,  in  partition  only  such  ; 
Otherwise  wrought  the  will  of  the  Most  High  ; 
Yet,  through  all  visitations  and  all  trials. 
Still  they  were  faithful  ;   like  two  vessels  launched 
From  the  same  beach  one  ocean  to  explore 
With  mutual  hel[),  and  sailing — lo  their  league 
True,  as  inexorable  winds,  or  bars 
Floating  or  fixed  of  polar  ice,  allow. 

But  turn  we  rather,  let  my  spirit  turn 
With  thine,  oh  silent  and  invisible  Friend  '  • 

To  those  dear  intervals,  nor  rare  nor  brief, 
When  reunited,  and  by  choice  withdrawn 
From  miscellaneous  converse,  ye  were  taught 
That  the  rememlirance  of  foregone  distress, 
And  the  worst  fear  of  future  ill  (which  oft 
Doth  hang  around  it,  as  a  sickly  child 
Upon  its  mother),  may  be  both  alike 
Disarmed  of  power  to  unsettle  present  good 
So  prized,  nnd  things  inward  and  outward  held 
In  such  an  even  balance,  that  the  heart 


324  CHARACTER    OF    LAMB. 

Acknowledges  God's  grace,  his  mercy  feels, 
And  in  its  depth  of  gratitude  is  still. 

Oh  gift  divine  of  quiet  sequestration ! 
The  hermit,  exercised  in  prayer  and  praise, 
And  feeding  daily  on  the  hope  of  heaven, 
Is  happy  in  his  vow,  and  fondly  cleaves 
To  life-long  singleness ;  but  happier  far 
Was,  to  your  souls,  and,  to  the  thoughts  of  others, 
A  thousand  times  more  beautiful  appeared, 
Your  dual  loneliness.    The  sacred  tie 
Is  broken ;  yet  why  grieve  ?  for  Time  but  holds 
His  moiety  in  trust,  till  Joy  shall  lead 
To  the  bless'd  world  where  parting  is  unknown." 


END    OF    lamb's    LETTERS    AND   LIFE. 


THE 


POETICAL    WORKS 


OF 


CHARLES     LAMB 


1 

i 


DEDICATION.* 


TO 

S.  T.  COLERIDGE,  ESQ. 

My  dear  Coleridge, 

You  will  srmle  to  see  the  slender  labours  of  your  friend  designated  by  the 
title  of  works ;  but  such  was  the  wish  of  the  gentlemen  who  have  kindly 
undertaken  the  trouble  of  collecting  them,  and  from  their  judgment  could  be 
no  appeal. 

It  would  be  a  kind  of  disloyalty  to  offer  to  any  one  but  yourself  a  volume 
contaming  the  early  pieces,  which  were  first  published  among  your  poems,  and 
were  fairly  derivatives  from  you  and  them.  My  friend  Lloyd  and  myself 
came  into  our  first  battle  (authorship  is  a  sort  of  warfare)  under  cover  of  the 
greater  Aja.x.  How  this  association,  which  shall  always  be  a  dear  and  proud 
recollection  to  me,  came  to  be  broken — who  snapped  the  three-fold  cord — 
whether  yourself  (but  1  know  that  was  not  the  case)  grew  ashamed  of  your 
former  companions— or  whether  (which  is  by  much  the  more  probable)  some 
ungracious  bookseller  was  author  of  the  separation — I  cannot  tell ;  but 
wanting  the  support  of  your  friendly  elm,  (I  speak  for  myself,)  my  vine  has, 
since  that  time,  put  forth  few  or  no  fruits  ;  the  sap  (if  ever  it  had  any)  has 
become,  in  a  manner,  dried  up  and  extinct;  and  you  will  find  your  old  asso- 
ciate, in  his  second  volume,  dwindled  into  prose  and  criticism. 

Am  I  right  m  assuming  this  as  the  cause  ?  or  is  it  that,  as  years  come  upon 
us,  (except  with  some  more  healthy-happy  spirits,)  life  itself  loses  much  of 
its  poetry  for  us  ?  we  transcribe  but  what  we  read  in  the  great  volume  of 
Nature  ;  and,  as  the  characters  grow  dim,  we  turn  off,  and  look  another  way. 
You  yourself  write  no  Christables  or  Ancient  Mariners  now. 

Some  of  the  sonnets,  which  shall  be  carelessly  turned  over  by  the  general 
reader,  may  happily  awaken  in  you  remembrances  which  1  should  be  sorry 
should  be  ever  totally  extinct — the  memory 

"  Of  summer  days  and  delightful  years"— 

even  so  far  back  as  to  those  old  suppers  at  our  old**********  Inn — when  life 
was  fresh  and  topics  exhaustless— and  you  first  kindled  in  me,  if  not  the 
power,  yet  the  love  of  poetry,  and  beauty,  and  kindliness. 

"  What  words  have  I  heard 
Spoke  at  the  Mermaid  '." 

The  world  has  given  you  many  a  shrewd  nip  and  gird  sinco  that  time,  but 
either  my  eyes  are  grown  dimmer,  or  my  old  tnerid  is  the  i^amr  who  stood  be- 
fore me  three-and-twenty  years  ago— his  hair  a  little  confessing  the  hand  of 
time,  but  still  shrouding  the  same  capacious  brain— his  heart  not  altered, 
scarcely  where  It  "alteration  finds." 

One  piece,  Coleridge,  I  have  ventured  to  publi.sh  in  its  original  form,  though 
1  have  heard  you  complain  of  a  certain  over-imitalion  of  the  antique  in  too 

•  Prefixed  to  the  author's  works  published  in  1818. 


328  DEDICATION. 

style.  If  I  could  see  any  way  of  getting  rid  of  the  objection  without  re- 
writing it  entirely,  I  would  make  some  sacrifices.  But  when  I  wrote  John 
Woodvil,  I  never  proposed  to  myself  any  distinct  deviation  from  common  Eng- 
lish. J  had  been  newly  initiated  in  the  writings  of  our  elder  dramatists ;  Beau- 
mont and  Fletcher,  and  Massinger,  were  then  a^  first  love ;  and  from  what  I 
was  so  freshly  conversant  in,  what  wonder  if  my  language  imperceptibly  took 
a  tinge  ?  The  very  time  which  I  had  chosen  for  my  story,  that  which  imme- 
diately followed  the  restoration,  seemed  to  require,  in  an  English  play,  that 
the  English  should  be  of  rather  an  older  cast  than  that  of  the  precise  year  in 
which  it  happened  to  be  written.  I  wish  it  had  not  some  faults,  which  I  can 
less  vindicate  than  the  language. 

1  remam, 
•  My  dear  Coleridge, 

Yours, 
With  unabated  esteem, 

C.  LAMB. 


CONTENTS. 


PAOS 

POEMS. 

Hester 331 

To  Charles  Lloyd,  an  Unexpected  Visiter 332 

The  Three  Friends 333 

To  a  River  in  which  a  Child  was  drowned 338 

The  Old  Familiar  Faces 338 

A  Vision  of  Repentance 339 

Queen  Oriana's  Dream 341 

A  Ballad,  noting  the  Difference  of  Rich  and  Poor,  in  the  ways  of  a 

rich  Noble's  Palace  and  a  poor  Workhouse       ....  342 

Hypochondriarus 343 

A  Farewell  to  Tobacco 344 

To  T.  L.  H.,  a  Child 348 

Ballad,  from  the  German 349 

Lines  on  the  celebrated  Picture  by  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  called  the  Vir- 
gin of  the  Rocks 350 

SONNETS. 

I.  To  Miss  Kelly 351 

IL  On  the  Sight  of  Swans  in  Kensington  Garden    ....  351 

III 352 

IV 352 

V 353 

VI 353 

Vir 354 

VIII.  The  Family  Name 354 

IX.  To  John  Lamb,  Esq.,  of  the  South  Sea  House  ....  355 

X 355 

XI 356 

BLANK  VERSE. 

Childhood 357 

The  Grandame 357 

The  Sabbath  Bells 358 

Fancy  employed  on  Divine  Subjects 359 

Composed  at  Midnight 359 

John  Woodvil,  a  Tragedy 361 

The  Witch,  a  Dramatic  Sketch  of  the  Seventeenth  Century       .        .  397 

ALBUM  VERSES,  &c 

In  the  Album  of  a  Clergyman's  Lady 401 

In  the  Autograph  Book  of  Mrs.  Sergeant  W ....  401 

In  the  Album  of  Edith  S 402 

To  Dora  W ,  on  bemg  asked  by  her  Father  to  write  in  her  Album  402 

In  the  Album  of  Rotha  Q 403 

In  the  Album  of  Catharine  Orkney 403 

In  the  Album  of  Lucy  Barton 404 

In  the  Album  of  Miss 405 

In  the  Album  of  Mrs.  Jane  Towers 405 


330  CONTENTS. 

PAOK 

In  my  own  Album 406 

Angel  Help 407 

The  Christening 408 

On  an  Infant  dying  as  soon  as  Bom 408 

The  Young  Catechist 410 

She  is  Going 411 

To  a  Young  Friend,  on  her  Twenty-first  Birthday      ....  411 

Harmony  in  Unlikenesa -        .  412 

Written  at  Cambridge 413 

To  a  celebrated  Female  Performer  in  the  *'  Blind  Boy"       .        .        .  413 

Work 414 

Leisure 414 

To  Samuel  Rogers,  Esq 415 

The  Gipsy's  Malison 415 

To  the  Author  of  Poems  published  under  the  Name  of  Barry  Corn- 
wall       416 

To  J.  S.  Knowles,  Esq.,  on  his  Tragedy  of  Virginius  ....  416 

To  the  Editor  of  the  "  Every -day  Book" 417 

To  T.  Stothard,  Esq.,  on  his  Illustrations  of  the  Poems  of  Mr.  Rogers  418 

To  a  Friend  on  his  Marriage 418 

The  Self-enchanted 419 

To  Louisa  M ,  whom  I  used  to  call  "  Monkey"     ....  420 

Oh  lift  with  Reverent  hand            420 

On  a  Sepulchral  Statue  of  an  Infant  Sleeping 421 

The  Rival  Bells 421 

Epitaph  on  a  Dog 422 

The  Ballad-singers 423 

To  David  Cook,  of  the  Parish  of  Saint  Margaret's,  Westminster, 

Watchman 424 

On  a  Deaf  and  Dumb  Artist 426 

Newton's  Principia 426 

The  Housekeeper ,  427 

The  Female  Orators 427 

Pindaric  Ode  to  the  Tread-mill 428 

Going  or  Gone 430 

Free  Thoughts  on  several  Eminent  Composers 433 

The  Wife's  Trial ;  or,  the  Intruding  Widow 435 


POEMS. 


HESTER. 

When  maidens  such  as  Hester  die, 
Their  place  ye  may  not  well  supply, 
Though  ye  among  a  thousand  try, 
With  vain  endeavour. 

A  month  or  more  hath  she  been  dead 
Yet  cannot  1  by  force  be  led 
To  think  upon  the  wormy  bed 
And  ner  together. 

A  springy  motion  in  her  gait, 
A  rising  step,  did  indicate 
Of  pride  and  joy  no  common  rate, 
That  flush'd  her  spirit. 

I  know  not  by  what  name  beside 
I  shall  it  call :  if  'twas  not  pride, 
It  was  a  joy  to  that  allied, 
She  did  inherit. 

Her  parents  held  the  Quaker  rule, 
Which  doth  the  human  feeling  cool, 
But  she  was  train'd  in  Nature's  schoo 
Nature  had  bless'd  her. 

A  waking  eye,  a  prying  mind, 
A  heart  that  stirs,  is  hard  to  blind, 
A  hawk's  keen  sight  ye  cannot  blind, 
Ye  could  not  Hester. 

My  sprightly  neighbour,  gone  before 
To  that  unknown  and  silent  shore, 
Shall  we  not  meet,  as  heretofore, 
Some  summer  morning, 


332  POEMS. 


When  from  thy  cheerful  eyes  a  ray 
Hath  struck  a  bliss  upon  the  day, 

A.  bliss  that  would  not  go  away, 
A  sweet  forewarning  ? 


TO  CHARLES  LLOYD, 

AN    UNEXPECTED    VISITER. 

Alone,  obscure,  without  a  friend, 

A  cheerless,  solitary  thing, 
Why  seeks  my  Lloyd  the  stranger  out  ? 

What  offering  can  the  stranger  bring 

Of  social  scenes,  homebred  delights, 
That  him  in  aught  compensate  may 

For  Stowey's  pleasant  winter  nights. 
For  loves  and  friendships  far  away  ? 

In  brief  oblivion  to  forego 

Friends,  such  as  thine,  so  justly  dear, 
And  be  a  while  with  me  content 

To  stay,  a  kindly  loiterer,  here : 

For  this  a  gleam  of  random  joy 

Hath  flush'd  my  unaccustom'd  cheek ; 

And,  with  an  o'ercharged,  bursting  heart, 
I  feel  the  thanks  I  cannot  speak. 

Oh  !  sweet  are  all  the  muses'  lays. 
And  sweet  the  charm  of  matin  bird  ; 

'Twas  long  since  these  estranged  ears 
The  sweeter  voice  of  friend  had  heard. 

The  voice  hath  spoke  :  the  pleasant  sounds 

In  mem'ry's  ear  in  after  time 
Shall  live,  to  sometimes  rouse  a  tear, 

And  sometimes  prompt  an  honest  rhyme. 

For,  when  the  transient  charm  is  fled. 
And  when  the  little  week  is  o'er. 

To  cheerless,  friendless  solitude 
When  I  return  as  heretofore, 


POEMS.  333 

Long,  long  within  my  aching  heart 

The  grateful  sense  shall  cherish'd  be  ; 
I'll  think,  less  meanly  of  myself, 

That  Lloyd  will  sometimes  think  on  me. 


THE  THREE  FRIENDS. 

Three  young  maids  in  friendship  met ; 

Mary,  Martha,  Margaret. 

Margaret  was  tall  and  fair, 

Martha  shorter  by  a  hair ; 

If  the  first  excell'd  in  feature, 

Th'  other's  grace  and  ease  were  greater ; 

Mary,  though  to  rival  loath, 

In  their  best  gifts  equall'd  both. 

They  a  due  proportion  kept ; 

Martha  mourn'd  if  Margaret  wept ; 

Margaret  joy'd  when  any  good 

She  of  Martha  understood  ; 

And  in  sympathy  for  either 

Mary  was  outdone  by  neither. 

Thus  far,  for  a  happy  space, 

All  three  ran  an  even  race, 

A  most  constant  friendship  proving, 

Equally  beloved  and  loving  ; 

All  their  wishes,  joys,  the  same  ; 

Sisters  only  not  in  name. 

Fortune  upon  each  one  smiled, 
As  upon  a  favourite  child  ; 
Well  to  do  and  well  to  see 
Were  the  parents  of  all  three  ; 
Till  on  Martha's  father  crosses 
Brought  a  flood  of  worldly  losses, 
And  his  fortunes  rich  and  great 
Changed  at  once  to  low  estate  ; 
Under  which  o'erwhelming  blow 
Martha's  mother  was  laid  low  ; 
She  a  hapless  orphan  left. 
Of  maternal  care  bereft. 
Trouble  following  trouble  fast, 
Lay  in  a  sick-bed  at  last. 


334  POEMS. 

In  tlie  depth  of  her  affliction 
Martha  now  received  conviction, 
That  a  true  and  faithful  friend 
Can  the  surest  comfort  lend. 
Night  and  day,  with  friendship  tried, 
Ever  constant  by  her  side 
Was  her  gentle  Mary  found, 
With  a  love  that  knew  no  bound ; 
And  the  solace  she  imparted 
Saved  her  dying  broken-hearted. 

In  this  scene  of  earthly  things 
Not  one  good  unmixed  springs. 
That  which  had  to  Martha  proved 
A  sweet  consolation,  moved 
Different  feelings  of  regret 
In  the  mind  of  Margaret. 
She,  whose  love  was  not  less  dear, 
Nor  affection  less  sincere 
To  her  friend,  was,  by  occasion 
Of  more  distant  habitation. 
Fewer  visits  forced  to  pay  her, 
When  no  other  cause  did  stay  her ; 
And  her  Mary  living  nearer, 
Margaret  began  to  fear  her, 
Lest  her  visits  day  by  day 
Martha's  heart  should  steal  away. 
That  whole  heart  she  ill  could  spare  her, 
Where  till  now  she'd  been  a  sharer. 
From  this  cause  with  grief  she  pined, 
Till  at  length  her  health  declined. 
All  her  cheerful  spirits  flew, 
Fast  as  Martha  gather'd  new ; 
And  her  sickness  waxed  sore, 
Just  when  Martha  felt  no  more. 

Mary,  who  had  quick  suspicion 
Of  her  alter'd  friend's  condition. 
Seeing  Martha's  convalescence 
Less  demanded  now  her  presence. 
With  a  goodness,  built  on  reason. 
Changed  her  measures  with  the  season ; 
Turn'd  her  steps  from  Martha's  door, 
Went  where  she  was  wanted  more  ; 
All  her  care  and  thoughts  were  set 
Now  to  tend  on  Margaret. 


POEMS.  335 

Mary  living  'tween  the  two, 
From  her  home  could  oft'ner  go, 
Either  of  her  friends  to  see, 
Than  they  could  together  be. 

Truth  explain'd  is  to  suspicion 
Evermore  the  best  physician. 
Soon  her  visits  had  the  effect ; 
All  that  Margaret  did  suspect 
From  her  fancy  vanish'd  clean ; 
She  was  soon  what  she  had  been, 
And  the  colour  she  did  lack 
To  her  faded  cheek  came  back. 
Wounds  which  love  had  made  her  feel. 
Love  alone  had  power  to  heal. 

Martha,  who  the  frequent  visit 
Now  had  lost,  and  sore  did  miss  it, 
With  impatience  waxed  cross, 
Counted  Margaret's  gain  her  loss : 
All  that  Mary  did  confer 
On  her  friend,  thought  due  to  her. 
In  her  girlish  bosom  rise 
Little  foolish  jealousies. 
Which  into  such  rancour  wrought, 
She  one  day  for  Margaret  sought ; 
Finding  her  by  chance  alone, 
She  began,  with  reason  shown, 
To  insinuate  a  fear 
Whether  Mary  was  sincere  ; 
Wish'd  that  Margaret  would  take  heed 
Whence  her  actions  did  proceed. 
For  herself,  she'd  long  been  minded 
Not  with  outsides  to  be  blinded  ; 
All  ihat  pity  and  compassion 
She  believed  was  affectation  ; 
In  her  heart  she  doubted  whether 
Mary  cared  a  pin  for  cither. 
She  could  keep  whole  weeks  at  distance. 
And  not  know  of  their  existence. 
While  all  things  remain'd  the  same; 
But,  when  some  misfortune  came. 
Then  she  made  a  great  parade 
Of  her  sympathy  and  aid — 
Not  that  she  did  really  grieve, 
It  was  only  make-believe  ; 


336  POEMS. 

And  she  cared  for  nothing,  so 
She  might  her  fine  feelings  show, 
And  get  credit,  on  her  part, 
For  a  soft  and  tender  heart. 

With  such  speeches,  smoothly  made, 
She  found  methods  to  persuade 
Margaret  (who,  being  sore 
From  the  doubts  she'd  felt  before, 
Was  prepared  for  mistrust) 
To  believe  her  reasons  just ; 
Quite  destroy'd  that  comfort  glad, 
Which  in  Mary  late  she  had ; 
Made  her,  in  experience's  spite. 
Think  her  friend  a  hypocrite, 
And  resolve,  with  cruel  scoff, 
To  renounce  and  cast  her  off. 

See  how  good  turns  are  rewarded ! 
She  of  both  is  now  discarded, 
Who  to  both  had  been  so  late 
Their  support  in  low  estate. 
All  their  comfort,  and  their  stay — 
Now  of  both  is  cast  away. 
But  the  league  her  presence  cherished, 
Losing  its  best  prop,  soon  perish'd ; 
She,  that  was  a  link  to  either, 
To  keep  them  and  it  together, 
Being  gone,  the  two  (no  wonder) 
That  were  left  soon  fell  asunder ; 
Some  civilities  were  kept, 
But  the  heart  of  friendship  slept ; 
Love  with  hollow  forms  was  fed, 
But  the  life  of  love  lay  dead : 
A  cold  intercourse  they  held. 
After  Mary  was  expell'd. 

Two  long  years  did  intervene 
Since  they'd  either  of  them  seen. 
Or,  by  letter,  any  word 
Of  their  old  companion  heard — 
When,  upon  a  day,  once  walking, 
Of  indifferent  matters  talking, 
They  a  female  figure  met ; 
Martha  said  to  Margaret, 


I 


POEMS.  91 

"  That  young  maid  in  face  does  carry 

A  resemblance  strong  of  Mary." 

Margaret,  at  nearer  sight, 

Own'd  her  observation  right; 

But  they  did  not  far  proceed 

Ere  they  knew  'twas  she  indeed. 

She — but,  ah !  how  changed  they  view  her 

From  that  person  which  they  knew  her ! 

Her  fine  face  disease  had  scarr'd, 

And  its  matchless  beauty  marr'd  ; 

But  enough  was  left  to  trace 

Mary*s  sweetness — Mary's  grace. 

"When  her  eye  did  first  behold  them, 

How  they  blush'd! — but  when  she  told  them 

How  on  a  sick-bed  she  lay 

Months,  while  they  had  kept  away, 

And  had  no  inquiries  made 

If  she  were  alive  or  dead ; 

How,  for  want  of  a  true  friend, 

She  was  brought  near  to  her  end, 

And  was  like  so  to  have  died, 

With  no  friend  at  her  bedside  ; 

How  the  constant  irritation, 

Caused  by  fruitless  expectation 

Of  their  coming,  had  extended 

The  illness,  when  she  might  have  mended^ 

Then,  oh  then,  how  did  reflection 

Come  on  then  with  recollection! 

All  that  she  had  done  for  them, 

How  it  did  their  fault  condemn. 

But  sweet  Mary,  still  the  same. 
Kindly  eased  them  of  their  shame  ; 
Spoke  to  them  with  accents  bland. 
Took  them  friendly  by  the  hand  ; 
Bound  them  both  with  promise  fast, 
Not  to  speak  of  troubles  past ; 
Made  ihejn  on  the  spot  declare 
A  new  league  of  friendship  there  ; 
Which,  without  a  word  of  strife, 
Lasted  thenceforth  long  as  life. 
Martha  now  and  Margaret 
Strove  who  most  should  pay  the  debt 
Which  they  owed  her,  nor  did  vary 
Ever  after  from  their  Mar> 
Vol.  I.— 29  P 


338  POEMS. 


TO  A  RIVER  IN  WHICH  A  CHILD  WAS 
DROWNED. 

Smiling  river,  smiling  river, 
On  thy  bosom  sunbeams  play ; 

Though  they're  fleeting  and  retreating, 
Thou  hast  more  deceit  than  they. 

In  thy  channel,  in  thy  channel. 

Choked  with  ooze  and  grav'lly  stones, 

Deep  immersed,  and  uuhearsed, 

Lies  young  Edward's  corse:   his  bones 

Ever  whitening,  ever  whitening, 
As  thy  waves  against  them  dash; 

What  thy  torrent  in  the  current 
Swallovv'd,  now  it  helps  to  wash. 

As  if  senseless,  as  if  senseless 
'J'hings  had  feeling  in  this  case  ; 

What  so  blindly  and  unkindly 
It  destroy'd,  it  now  does  grace. 


THE  OLD  FAMILIAR  FACES. 

I  HAVE  had  playmates,  I  have  had  companions, 
In  my  days  of  childhood,  in  my  joyful  schooldays, 
All,  all  are  gone,  the  old  familiar  faces. 

I  have  been  laughing,  I  have  been  carousing, 
Drinking  late,  silting  late,  with  my  bosom  cronies, 
All,  all  are  gone,  the  old  familiar  faces. 

I  loved  a  love  once,  fairest  among  women  ; 
Closed  are  her  doors  on  me,  I  must  not  see  her — 
All,  all  are  gone,  the  old  familiar  faces. 

I  have  a  friend,  a  kinder  friend  has  no  man  ; 
Like  an  ingrate,  I  left  my  friend  abruptly  ; 
Left  him,  to  muse  on  the  old  familiar  faces. 


POEMS.  339 

Ghost-like  I  paced  round  the  haunts  of  my  childhood, 
Earth  seem'd  a  desert  1  was  bound  to  traverse, 
Seeking  to  find  the  old  familiar  faces. 

Friend  of  my  bosom,  thou  more  than  a  brother, 
Why  wert  not  thou  born  in  my  fathers  dwelling? 
So  might  we  talk  of  the  old  familiar  faces — 

How  some  they  have  died,  and  some  they  have  left  me, 
And  some  are  taken  from  me  ;  all  are  departed ; 
All,  all  are  gone,  the  old  familiar  faces. 


A  VISION  OF  REPENTANCE. 

I  SAW  a  famous  fountain,  in  my  dream. 
Where  shady  pathways  to  a  valley  led  ; 

A  weeping  willow  lay  upon  that  stream, 

And  all  around  the  fountain  brink  were  spread 

Wide-branching  trees,  w^iih  dark-green  leaf  rich  clad, 

Forming  a  doubtful  twilight — desolate  and  sad. 

The  place  was  such,  that  whoso  enter'd  in. 
Disrobed  was  of  every  earthly  thought, 

And  straight  became  as  one  that  knew  not  sin, 
Or  to  the  world's  first  innocence  was  brought ; 

Enseem'd  it  now%  he  stood  on  holy  ground. 

In  sweet  and  tender  melancholy  wrapp'd  around. 

A  most  strange  calm  stole  o'er  my  soothed  sprite  ; 

Long  time  I  stood,  and  longer  had  I  stayd, 
"\\  hen,  lo  !   1  saw,  saw  by  the  sweet  moonlight, 

Which  came  in  silence  o'er  that  silent  shade, 
Where,  near  the  fountain,  somkiiiinc;  like  dk.si'air 
Made,  of  that  weeping  willow,  garlands  for  her  hair. 

And  eke  witii  painful  fingers  she  inwove 
Many  an  uncouth  stem  of  savage  thorn — 

"The  willow  garland,  that  was  for  her  love. 
And  these  her  bleeding  temples  would  adorn." 

With  sighs  her  heart  nigh  burst,  salt  tears  fast  fell, 

As  mournfully  she  bended  o'er  that  sacred  well. 

P3 


340  POEMS. 

To  whom  when  I  address'd  myself  to  speak, 
She  lifted  up  her  eyes,  and  nothing  said  ; 

The  delicate  red  came  mantling  o'er  her  cheek, 
And,  gath'ring  up  her  loose  attire,  she  fled 

To  the  dark  covert  of  that  woody  shade, 

And  in  her  goings  seem'd  a  timid,  gentle  maid. 

Revolving  in  my  mind  what  this  should  mean, 

And  why  that  lovely  lady  plained  so ; 
Perplex'd  in  thought  at  that  mysterious  scene, 

And  doubting  if 'twere  best  to  stay  or  go, 
I  cast  mine  eyes  in  wistful  gaze  around, 
When  from  the  shades  came  slow  a  small  and  plaintive 
sound. 

"  Psyche  am  I,  who  love  to  dwell 
In  these  brown  shades,  this  woody  dell, 
Where  never  busy  mortal  came. 
Till  now,  to  pry  upon  my  shame. 

At  thy  feet  what  thou  dost  see 
The  waters  of  repentance  be, 
Which,  night  and  day,  I  must  augment 
With  tears,  like  a  true  penitent, 

If  haply  so  my  day  of  grace 
Be  not  yet  past ;  and  this  lone  place, 
O'ershadowy,  dark,  excludeth  hence 
All  thoughts  but  grief  and  penitence." 

"  Why  dost  thou  weep,  thou  gentle  maid  / 
And  wherefore  in  this  barren  shade 
Thy  hidden  thoughts  with  sorrow  feed  ? 
Can  thing  so  fair  repentance  need  .^" 

"  Oh  !  I  have  done  a  deed  of  shame, 
And  tainted  is  my  virgin  fame. 
And  stnin'd  the  beauteous  maiden  white, 
In  which  my  bridal  robes  were  dight." 

"  And  ivho  the  promised  spouse,  declare : 
And  what  those  h'idal  garments  were.^^ 

"  Severe  and  saintly  righteousness 
Composed  the  clear  white  bridal  dress  ; 
Jesus,  the  son  of  Heaven's  high  king, 
Bought  with  his  blood  the  marriage-ring. 


POEMS.  341 

A  wretched  sinful  creature,  I 
DeemM  lightly  of  that  sacred  tie, 
Gave  to  a  treacherous  world  my  heart, 
And  play'd  the  foolish  wanton's  part. 

Soon  to  these  murky  shades  1  came, 

To  hide  from  the  sun's  light  my  shame. 

And  still  I  haunt  this  woody  dell, 

And  bathe  me  in  that  healing  well. 

Whose  waters  clear  have  influence 

From  sin's  foul  stains  the  soul  to  cleanse  ; 

And,  night  and  day,  I  them  augment 

With  tears,  like  a  true  penitent. 

Until,  due  expiation  made. 

And  fit  atonement  fully  paid. 

The  lord  and  bridegroom  me  present. 

Where  in  sweet  strains  of  high  consent, 

God's  throne  before,  tlie  Seraphim 

Shall  chant  the  ecstatic  marriage  hymn." 

'*Now  Christ  restore  thee  soon" — I  said, 
And  thenceforth  all  my  dream  was  fled. 


29* 


QUEEN  ORIANA'S  DREAM. 

On  a  bank  with  roses  shaded, 
Whose  sweet  scent  the  violets  aided, 
Violets  whose  breath  alone 
Yields  but  feeble  smell  or  none, 
(Sweeter  bed  Jove  ne'er  reposed  on 
When  his  eyes  Olympus  closed  on,) 
While  o'er  head  six  slaves  did  hold 
Canopy  of  cloth  o'  gold, 
And  two  more  did  music  keep, 
Which  might  Juno  lull  to  sleep, 
Oriana  who  was  queen 
To  the  mighty  Tamerlane, 
That  was  lord  of  all  the  land 
Between  Thrace  and  Samarchand, 
While  the  noontide  fervour  beam'd, 
Mused  herself  to  sleep,  and  dreani'd. 


342  POEMS. 


Thus  far,  in  magnific  strain, 
A  young  poet  sooth'd  his  vein  ; 
But  he  had  nor  prose  nor  numbers 
To  express  a  princess'  slumbers. 
Youthful  Richard  had  strange  fancies, 
Was  deep  versed  in  old  romances, 
And  could  talk  whole  hours  upon 
The  great  cham  and  Prester  John — 
Tell  the  field  in  which  the  Sophi 
From  the  Tartar  won  a  trophy — 
What  he  read  with  such  delight  of, 
Thought  he  could  as  eas'ly  write  of — 
But  his  over-young  invention 
Kept  not  pace  with  brave  intention. 
Twenty  suns  did  rise  and  set, 
And  he  could  no  farther  get  ; 
But,  unable  to  proceed. 
Made  a  virtue  out  of  need. 
And,  his  labours  wiselier  deem'd  of. 
Did  omit  what  the  queen  dreairi'd  of. 


A  BALLAD : 

NOTING    THE    DIFFERENCE    OF     RICH    AND    POOR,    IN    THE    WAYS 
OF    A    RICH   noble's    PALACE    AND    A    POOR    WORKHOUSE. 

To  the  tune  of  the  "  Old  and  Young  Courtier" 

In  a  costly  palace  Youth  goes  clad  in  gold ; 
In  a  wretched  workhouse  Age's  limbs  are  cold  : 
There  they  sit,  the  old  men  by  a  shivering  fire, 
Still  close  and  closer  cowering,  warmth  is  their  desire. 

In  a  costly  palace,  when  the  brave  gallants  dine,  ^ 

They  have  store  of  good  venison,  with  old  Canary  wine,  I 

With  singing  and  music  to  heighten  the  cheer  ;  " 
Coarse  bits,  with  grudging,  are  the  pauper's  best  fare. 

In  a  costly  palace  Youth  is  still  caress'd 

By  a  train  of  attendants  which  laugh  at  my  young  lord's 

jest ;  I 


POEMS.  343 

In  a  wretched  workhouse  the  contrary  prevails  : 
Does  Age    begin   to  praiile,  no  man  heark'neth  to  his 
tales. 

In  a  costly  palace  if  the  child  wiih  a  pin 

Do  but  chance   to  prick  a  finger,  straight  the   doctor  is 

called  in  ; 
In  a  wretched  workhouse  men  are  left  to  perish 
For  want  of  proper  cordials,  which  their  old  age  might 

cherish. 

In  a  costly  palace  Youth  enjoys  his  lust ; 
In  a  wretched  workhouse  Age,  in  corners  thrust. 
Thinks  upon  the  former  days,  when  he  was  well  to  do, 
Had  children  to  stand  by  him,  both  friends  and  kinsman 
too. 

In  a  costly  palace  Youth  his  temples  hides 
With  a  new-devised  peruke  that  reaches  to  his  sides  ; 
In  a  wretched  workhouse  Age's  crown  is  bare, 
With  a  few  thin  lucks  just  to  fence  out  the  cold  air. 

In  peace,  as  in  war,  'tis  our  young  gallant's  pride, 
To  walk,  each  one  i'  the  streets,  with  a  rapier  by  his  side, 
That  none  to  do  them  injury  may  have  pretence  ; 
Wretched  age,  in  poverty,  must  brook  offence. 


HYPOCHONDRIACUS. 

By  myself  walking, 
To  myself  talkiiio, 
\\  hrii  ;js  I  rnniinHte 
On  jny  untoward  fate. 
Scarcely  seem  I 
Alone  suffniciitly, 
Black  thounhts  continually 
Crowding  my  privacy; 
'I  hey  come  unhidden, 
Iid<e  f(tes  a!  a  \^  edding, 
'riniisiing  ih<Mr  faces 
In  belter  g^(^^ts'  places, 
Peevish  and  malecciilent. 
Clownish,  impertinent, 
Dashinc  the  merriment : 


344  POEMS. 

So  in  like  fashions 

Dim  cogitations 

Follow  and  haunt  me» 

Striving  to  daunt  me, 

In  my  heart  festering, 

In  my  ears  whispering, 

"  Thy  friends  are  treacherous, 

Thy  foes  are  dangerous, 

Thy  dreams  ominous." 

•  Fierce  Anthropophagi, 
Spectre,  diaboli, 
What  scared  St.  Antony, 
Hobgoblins,  lemures, 
Dreams  of  antipodes, 
Night-riding  incubi 
Troubling  the  fantasy, 
All  dire  illusions 
Causing  confusions ; 
Figments  heretical, 
Scruples  fantastical. 
Doubts  diabolical, 
Abaddon  vexeth  me, 
Mahu  perplexeth  me, 
Lucifer  teareth  me — 

Jesu  I  Maria .'  liberate  nos  ab  his  diris  tentationibus  Inimict. 


A  FAREWELL  TO  TOBACCO. 

May  the  Babylonish  curse 

Straight  confound  my  stammering  verse, 

If  I  can  a  passage  see 

In  this  word-perplexity. 

Or  a  fit  expression  find. 

Or  a  language  to  my  mind, 

(Still  the  phrase  is  wide  or  scant,) 

To  take  leave  of  thee,  great  plant  ! 

Or  in  any  terms  relate 

Half  my  love,  or  half  my  hate  : 

For  I  hate,  yet  love  thee  so. 

That,  whichever  thing  I  show, 


POEMS.  345 

The  plain  truth  will  seem  to  be, 
A.  constrain'd  hyperbole, 
And  the  passion  to  proceed 
More  from  a  mistress  than  a  weed. 

Sooty  retainer  to  the  vine, 
Bacchus'  black  servant,  negro  fine  ; 
Sorcerer  that  mak'st  us  dote  upon 
Thy  begrimmed  complexion, 
And,  for  thy  pernicious  sake, 
More  and  greater  oaths  to  break 
Than  reclaimed  lovers  take 
'Gainst  women  :  thou  thy  siege  dost  lay 
Much  too  in  the  female  wav, 
While  thou  suck'st  the  lab'ring  breath 
Faster  than  kisses  or  than  death. 

Thou  in  such  a  cloud  dost  bind  us 
That  our  worst  foes  cannot  find  us. 
And  ill-fortune,  that  would  thwart  us, 
Shoots  at  rovers,  shooting  at  us  ; 
While  each  man,  through  thy  heightening  steam, 
Does  like  a  smoking  Etna  seem, 
And  all  about  us  does  express 
(Fancy  and  wit  in  richest  dress) 
A  Sicilian  fruilfulness. 

Thou  through  such  a  mist  dost  show  us, 
That  our  best  friends  do  not  know  us, 
And  for  those  allowed  features, 
Due  to  reasonable  creatures, 
Liken'st  us  to  fell  chimeras. 
Monsters  that,  who  see  us,  fear  us  ; 
Worse  than  Cerberus  or  Geryon, 
Or,  who  first  loved  a  cloud,  Ixion. 

Bacchus  we  know,  and  we  allow 
His  tipsy  rites.     But  what  art  thou,  " 
That  but  by  reflex  canst  show 
What  his  deity  can  do, 
As  the  false  Egyptian  spell 
Aped  the  true  Hebrew  miracle  ? 
Some  few  vapours  thou  mayst  raise, 
The  weak  brain  may  serve  to  amaze, 
But  to  the  reins  and  nobler  heart 
Canst  nor  life  nor  heat  impart. 
P3 


346  POEMS. 


Brother  of  Bacchus,  later  born, 
The  old  world  was  sure  forlorn, 
Wanting  thee,  that  aidest  more 
The  god's  victories  than  before 
All  his  panthers,  and  the  brawls 
Of  his  piping  bacchanals. 
These,  as  stale,  we  disallow, 
Or  judge  of  thee  meant :  only  thou 
His  true  Indian  conquest  art ; 
And  for  ivy,  round  his  dart 
The  reformed  god  now  weaves 
A  finer  thyrsus  of  thy  leaves. 

Scent  to  match  thy  rich  perfume, 
Chymic  art  did  ne'er  presume 
Through  her  quaint  alembic  strain, 
None  so  sovereign  to  the  brain. 
Nature,  that  did  in  thee  excel, 
Framed  again  no  second  smell. 
Roses,  violets,  but  toys 
For  the  smaller  sort  of  boys. 
Or  for  greener  damsels  meant ; 
Thou  art  the  only  manly  scent. 

Stinking'st  of  the  stinking  kind, 
Filih  of  the  mouth  and  fog  of  the  mind, 
Africa,  that  brags  her  foyson, 
Breeds  no  such  prodigious  poison. 
Henbane,  nightshade,  both  together, 
Hemlock,  aconite — 

Nay,  rather, 
Plant  divine,  of  rarest  virtue  ; 
Blisters  on  the  tongue  would  hurt  you. 
'Twas  but  in  a  sort  I  blamed  thee  ; 
None  e'er  prosper'd  who  defamed  thee  ; 
Irony  all,  and  feign'd  abuse, 
Such  as  perplex'd  lovers  use,  I 

At  a  need,  when,  in  despair  -f 

To  paint  forth  their  fairest  fair,  'J 

Or,  in  part,  but  to  express 
That  exceeding  comeliness  ji 

Which  their  fancies  doth  so  strike,  ~ 

They  borrow  language  of  dislike  ; 
And,  instead  of  dearest  miss, 
Jewel,  honey,  sweatheart,  bliss, 


POEMS.  347 

And  those  forms  of  old  admiring, 
Call  her  cockatrice  and  siren, 
Basilisk,  and  all  that's  evil, 
Witch,  hyena,  mermaid,  devil, 
Ethiop,  wench,  and  blackamoor, 
iVIonkey,  ape,  and  twenty  more  ; 
Friendly  trait'ress,  loving  foe — 
N^ot  that  she  is  truly  so, 
But  no  other  way  they  know 
A.  contentment  to  express, 
Borders  so  upon  excess, 
That  they  do  not  rightly  wot 
Whether  it  be  pain  or  not. 

Or,  as  men  constrain'd  to  part 
With  what's  nearest  to  their  heart, 
While  their  sorrow's  at  the  height, 
Lose  discrimination  quite, 
And  their  hasty  wrath  let  fall, 
To  appease  their  frantic  gall. 
On  the  darling  tiling  whatever, 
Whence  they  feel  it  death  to  sever, 
Though  it  be,  as  they,  perforce, 
Guiltless  of  the  sad  divorce. 

For  I  must  (nor  let  it  grieve  thee, 
Friendliest  of  plants,  that  I  must)  leave  thee. 
For  thy  sake,  tobacco,  I 
Would  do  anylhiuff  but  die, 
And  but  seek  to  extend  my  days 
Long  enough  to  sing  thy  praise. 
But,  as  she,  who  once  hath  been 
A  king's  consort,  is  a  queen 
Ever  after,  nor  will  bate 
Any  tittle  of  her  state, 
Though  a  widow,  or  divorced, 
So  I,  from  thy  converse  forced, 
'J'he  old  name  and  style  retain, 
A  right  Catharine  of  Spain  ; 
And  a  seat,  too,  'mong  the  joys 
Of  the  bUss'd  tobacco  boys  ; 
Where,  though  I,  by  sour  physician, 
Am  debarr'd  the  full  fruition 
Of  thy  favours,  I  may  catch 
Some  collateral  sweets,  and  snatch 


34^  FOEMS. 


Sidelong  odours,  that  give  life 
Like  glances  from  a  neighbour's  wife ; 
And  still  live  in  the  by-places 
And  the  suburbs  of  thy  graces  ; 
And  in  thy  borders  take  delight, 
A.n  unconquer'd  Canaanite. 


TO  T.  L.  H. 

A    CHILD. 

Model  of  thy  parent  dear, 
Serious  infant  worth  a  fear : 
In  thy  unfaltering  visage  well 
Picturing  forth  the  son  of  Tell, 
When  on  his  forehead,  firm  and  good, 
Motionless  mark,  the  apple  stood ; 
Guileless  traitor,  rebel  mild, 
Convict  unconscious,  culprit-child ! 
Gates  that  close  with  iron  roar 
Have  been  to  thee  thy  nursery  door ; 
Chains  that  chink  in  cheerless  cells 
Have  been  thy  rattles  and  thy  bells  ; 
Walls  contrived  for  giant  sin 
Have  hemm'd  thy  faultless  weakness  in* 
Near  thy  sinless  bed  black  Guilt 
Her  discordant  house  hath  built, 
And  fill'd  it  with  her  monstrous  brood — 
Sights  by  thee  not  understood — 
Sights  of  fear,  and  of  distress, 
That  pass  a  harmless  infant's  guess  ! 

But  the  clouds  that  overcast 
Thy  young  morning  may  not  last. 
Soon  shall  arrive  the  rescuing  hour, 
That  yields  thee  up  to  Nature's  po>-  ■ 
Nature,  that  so  late  doth  greet  thee. 
Shall  in  o'erflowing  measure  meet  theo. 
She  shall  recompense  with  cost 
For  every  lesson  thou  hast  lost. 
Then  wandering  up  thy  sire's  loved  hill,* 
Thou  shalt  take  thy  airy  fill 

*  Hampetead. 


POEMS.  349 

Of  health  and  pastime.     Birds  shall  sing 

For  thy  delight  each  May  morning. 

Mid  new-yean'd  lambkins  thou  shalt  play, 

Hardly  less  a  lamb  than  they. 

Then  thy  prison's  lengthen'd  bound 

Shall  be  the  horizon  skirting  round. 

And,  while  thou  fill'st  thy  lap  with  flowers, 

To  make  amends  for  wintry  hours, 

The  breeze,  the  sunshine,  and  the  place, 

Shall  from  thy  tender  brow  efface 

Each  vestige  of  untimely  care, 

That  sour  restraint  had  graven  there  ; 

And  on  thy  every  look  impress 

A  more  excelling  childishness. 

So  shall  be  thy  days  beguiled, 
Thornton  Hunt,  my  favourite  child. 


BALLAD. 

FROM    THE    GERMAN. 

The  clouds  are  blackening,  the  storms  threatening, 
And  ever  the  forest  maketh  a  moan : 

Billows  are  breaking,  the  damsel's  heart  aching. 
Thus  by  herself  she  singetli  alone, 
Weeping  right  plenteously. 

"  The  world  is  empty,  the  heart  is  dead,  surely, 
In  this  world  plainly  all  seemeth  amiss : 

To  thy  breast,  holy  one,  take  now  thy  little  one, 
I  have  had  earnest  of  all  earth's  bliss, 
Living  right  lovingly." 


350  POEMS. 


LINES 

ON    THE    CELEBRATED    PICTURE    BY    LEONARDO    DA    VINCI, 
CALLED    THE    VIRGIN    OF    THE    ROCKS. 

While  young  John  runs  to  greet 

The  greater  infant's  feet, 

The  mother,  standing  by,  with  trembling  passion 

Of  devout  admiration, 

Beholds  the  engaging  mystic  play,  and  pretty  adora- 
tion ; 

Nor  knows  as  yet  the  full  event 

Of  those  so  low  beginnings, 

From  whence  we  date  our  winnings, 

But  W'Onders  at  the  intent 

Of  those  new  rites,  and  what  that  strange  child-worship 
meant. 

But  at  her  side 

An  angel  doth  abide. 

With  such  a  perfect  joy 

As  no  dim  doubts  alloy, 

An  intuition, 

A  glory,  an  amenity, 

Passing  the  dark  condition 

Of  blind  humanity, 

As  if  he  surely  knew 

All  the  bless'd  wonders  should  ensue. 

Or  he  had  lately  left  the  upper  sphere, 

And  had  read  all  the  sov'reign  schemes  and  divine  rid- 
dles there. 


I 


I 


SONNETS. 
I. 

TO    MISS    KELLY. 

You  are  not,  Kelly,  of  the  common  strain, 

That  stoop  their  pride  and  female  honour  down 

To  please  that  many-headed  beast,  the  town, 

And  vend  their  lavish  smiles  and  tricks  for  gain  ; 

By  fortune  thrown  amid  the  actors'  train. 

You  keep  your  native  dignity  of  thought; 

The  plaudits  that  attend  you  come  unsought, 

As  tributes  due  unto  your  natural  vein. 

Your  tears  have  passion  in  them,  and  a  grace 

Of  genuine  freshness,  which  our  hearts  avow  ; 

Your  smiles  are  winds  whose  ways  we  cannot  trace. 

That  vanish  and  return  we  know  not  how — 

And  please  the  better  from  a  pensive  face, 

A  thoughtful  eye,  and  a  reflecting  brow. 


IL 

ON    THE    SIGHT    OF    SWANS    IN    KENSINGTON    GARDEN. 

Queen-bird  that  sittest  on  thy  shining  nest, 
And  thy  young  cygnets  without  sorrow  hatchest, 
And  thou,  thou  other  royal  bird  that  wachest 
Lest  the  white  mother  wandering  feet  molest : 
Shrined  are  your  ofi'spring  in  a  crystal  cradle, 
Brighter  than  Helen's  ere  she  yet  had  burst 
Her  shelly  prison.     They  shall  be  born  at  first 
Strong,  active,  graceful,  perfect,  swaii-like,  able 


352  SONNETS. 

To  tread  the  land  or  waters  with  security. 
Unlike  poor  human  births,  conceived  in  sin, 
In  grief  brought  forth,  both  outwardly  and  in 
Confessing  weakness,  error,  and  impurity. 
Did  heavenly  creatures  own  succession's  line, 
The  births  of  heaven  like  to  yours  would  shine. 


♦  III. 

Was  it  some  sweet  device  of  fairy 

That  mock'd  my  steps  with  many  a  lonely  glade. 

And  fancied  wanderings  with  a  fair-hair'd  maid  ? 

Have  these  things  been  ?  or  what  rare  witchery, 

Impregning  with  delights  the  charmed  air, 

Enlighted  up  the  semblance  of  a  smile 

In  those  fine  eyes  ?  methought  they  spake  the  while 

Soft  soothing  things,  which  might  enforce  despair 

To  drop  the  murdering  knife,  and  let  go  by 

His  foul  resolve.     And  does  the  lonely  glade 

Still  court  the  footsteps  of  the  fair-hair'd  maid  ? 

Still  in  her  locks  the  gales  of  summer  sigh  ? 

While  I,  forlorn,  do  wander  reckless  where, 

And  mid  my  wanderings  meet  no  Anna  there. 


IV. 

Methinks  how  dainty  sweet  it  were,  reclined 

Beneath  the  vast  outstretching  branches  high 

Of  some  old  wood,  in  careless  sort  to  lie. 

Nor  of  the  busier  scenes  we  left  behind 

Aught  envying.     And  oh,  Anna  !  mild-eyed  maid  ! 

Beloved !  I  were  well  content  to  play 

With  thy  free  tresses  all  a  summer's  day, 

Losing  the  time  beneath  the  greenwood  shade. 

Or  we  might  sit  and  tell  some  tender  tale 

Of  faithful  vows  repaid  by  cruel  scorn, 

A  tale  of  true  love,  or  of  friend  forgot ; 

And  I  would  teach  thee,  lady,  how  to  rail 

In  gentle  sort  on  those  who  practise  not 

Or  love  or  pity,  though  of  woman  born. 


^SONNETS.  3d3 


V. 

When  last  I  roved  these  wind.i;^^wood-walks  green, 

Green  winding  walks,  and  sliady  pathways  sweet, 

Ofttimes  would  Anna  seek  the  silent  scene. 

Shrouding  her  beauties  in  the  lone  retreat. 

No  more  1  hear  her  footsteps  in  the  shade  : 

Her  image  only  in  these  pleasant  ways 

Meets  me  self-wandering,  where  in  happier  days 

I  held  free  converse  with  the  fair-hair'd  maid. 

I  pass'd  the  little  cottage  which  she  loved. 

The  cottage  which  did  once  my  all  contain  ; 

It  spake  of  days  which  ne'er  must  come  again, 

Spake  to  my  heart,  and  much  my  heart  was  moved. 

*'  Now  fair  befall  thee,  gentle  maid !"  I  said, 

And  from  the  cottage  turn'd  me  with  a  sigh. 


VI. 

A  TIMID  grace  sits  trembling  in  her  eye, 

As  loath  to  meet  the  rudeness  of  men's  sight, 

Yet  shedding  a  delicious  lunar  light. 

That  steeps  in  kind  oblivious  ecstasy 

The  care-crazed  mind,  like  some  still  melody : 

Speaking  most  plain  the  thoughts  which  do  possess 

Her  gentle  sprite  :  peace,  and  meek  quietness, 

And  innocent  loves,  and  maiden  purity  : 

A  look  whereof  might  heal  the  cruel  smart 

Of  changed  friends,  or  fortune's  wrongs  unkind  ; 

Might  to  sweet  deeds  of  mercy  move  the  heart 

Of  him  who  hates  his  brethren  of  mankind. 

Turn'd  are  those  lights  from  me,  who  fondly  ye 

Past  joys,  vain  loves,  and  buried  hopes  regret. 

30* 


354-  SONNETS. 


VII. 


If  from  my  lips  some  angry  accents  fell, 

Peevish  complaint,  or  harsh  reproof  unkind, 

'Twas  but  the  error  of  a  sickly  mind 

And  troubled  thoughts,  clouding  the  purer  well 

And  waters  clear  of  Reason  ;  and  for  me 

Let  this  my  verse  the  poor  atonement  be — 

My  verse,  which  thou  to  praise  wert  ever  inclined 

Too  highly,  and  with  a  partial  eye  to  see 

No  blemish.     Thou  to  me  didst  ever  show 

Kindest  affection  ;  and  would  ofttimes  lend 

An  ear  to  the  desponding  love-sick  lay, 

Weeping  my  sorrows  with  me,  who  repay 

But  ill  the  mighty  debt  of  love  I  owe, 

Mary,  to  thee,  my  sister  and  my  friend. 


VIII. 


THE    FAMILY    NAME. 


What  reason  first  imposed  thee,  gentle  name, 
Name  that  my  father  bore,  and  his  sire's  sire, 
Without  reproach?  we  trace  our  stream  no  higher; 
And  I,  a  childless  man,  may  end  the  same. 
Perchance  some  shepherd  on  Lincolnian  plains, 
In  manners  guileless  as  his  own  sweet  flocks, 
Received  thee  first  amid  the  merry  mocks 
And  arch  illusions  of  his  fellow-swains. 
Perchance  from  Salem's  holier  fields  return'd, 
With  glory  gotten  on  the  heads  abhorr'd 
Of  faithless  Saracens,  some  martial  lord 
Took  HIS  meek  title,  in  whose  zeal  he  burn'd. 
Whate'er  the  fount  whence  thy  beginnings  came, 
No  deed  of  mine  shall  shame  thee,  gentle  name. 


SONNETS.  355 


IX. 


TO    JOHN    LAMB,  ESQ.,  OF    THE    SOUTH-SEA  HOUSE. 

John,  you  were  figuring  in  the  gay  career 
Of  blooming  manhood  with  a  young  man's  joy, 
When  I  was  yet  a  little  peevish  boy — 
Though  time  has  made  the  difference  disappear 
Between  our  ages,  which  then  seem'd  so  great — 
And  still  by  rightful  custom  you  retain 
Much  of  the  old  authoritative  strain, 
And  keep  the  «lder  brother  up  in  state. 
Oh  !  you  do  well  in  this.     'Tis  man's  worst  deed 
To  let  the  "things  that  have  been"  run  to  waste, 
And  in  the  unmeaning  present  sink  the  past: 
In  whose  dim  glass  even  now  I  faintly  read 
Old  buried  forms,  and  faces  long  ago, 
AVhich  you,  and  I,  and  one  more  only  know. 


X. 

Oh!   I  could  laugh  to  hear  the  midnight  wind, 
That,  rushing  on  its  way  with  careles-  sweep. 
Scatters  the  ocean  waves.     And  I  could  weep 
Like  to  a  child.     For  now  to  my  raised  mind 
On  wings  of  winds  comes  wild-eyed  Phantasy, 
And  her  rude  visions  give  severe  delight. 
Oh,  wijigcd  liark  !   how  swift  along  the  night 
Pass'd  thv  [)roud  keel  !   nor  shall  I  let  go  by 
liightly  of  that  drear  hour  the  memory, 
When  wet  and  chilly  on  tliy  deck  I  stood, 
Unhonncited,  and  gazed  upon  the  Hood, 
Even  till  it  seem'd  a  pleasant  thing  to  die — 
To  be  resolved  into  th'  elemental  wave, 
Or  take  my  portion  with  the  winds  that  rave. 


966  SONNET*. 


XL 

We  were  two  pretty  babes,  the  youngest  she, 
The  youngest,  and  the  loveliest  far,  I  ween, 
And  Innocence  her  name.     The  time  has  been 
We  two  did  love  each  otlier's  company ; 
Time  was  we  two  had  wept  to  have  been  apart. 
But  when,  by  show  of  seeming  good  beguiled, 
I  left  the  garb  and  manners  of  a  child, 
And  my  first  love  for  man's  society. 
Defiling  with  the  world  my  virgin  heart — 
My  loved  companion  dropp'd  a  tear,  and  fled, 
And  hid  in  deepest  shades  her  awful  head. 
Beloved,  who  shall  tell  me  where  thou  art — 
In  what  delicious  Eden  to  be  found — 
That  I  may  seek  thee  the  wide  world  around  ? 


BLANK   VERSE. 


CHILDHOOD. 

In  my  poor  mind  it  is  most  sweet  to  muse 

Upon  the  days  gone  by  ;  to  act  in  thought 

Past  seasons  o'er,  and  be  again  a  child ; 

To  sit  in  fancy  on  the  turf-clad  slope, 

Down  which  the  child  would  roll ;  to  pluck  gay  flowers, 

Make  posies  in  the  sun,  which  the  child's  hand 

(Childhood  ofTended  soon,  soon  reconciled) 

Would  throw  away,  and  straight  take  up  again, 

Then  fling  them  to  the  winds,  and  o'er  the  lawn 

Bound  with  so  playful  and  so  light  a  foot. 

That  the  press'd  daisy  scarce  declined  her  head. 


THE  GRANDAME. 

On  the  green  hill-top, 
Hard  by  the  house  of  prayer,  a  modest  roof. 
And  not  distinguish'd  from  its  neighbour-barn. 
Save  by  a  slender-tapering  length  of  spire. 
The  grandame  sleeps.     A  plain  sione  barely  tells 
The  name  and  date  to  the  chance  ])assenger. 
For  lowly  horn  was  she,  and  long  had  eat, 
Well-earn'd,  the  bread  of  service  :  hers  was  else 
A  mounting  spirit,  one  that  entoriain'd 
Scorn  of  base  action,  deed  di^ihonourable, 
Or  aught  unseemly.     I  remember  well 
Her  reverend  image  :  I  remember,  too, 
With  what  a  zeal  she  served  her  master's  house  ; 
And  how  the  prattling  tongue  of  garrulous  age 
Delighted  to  recount  the  oft-told  tale 


358  BLANK    VERSE. 

Or  anecdote  domestic.     Wise  she  was, 

And  wondrous  skill'd  in  genealogies, 

And  could  in  apt  and  voluble  terms  discourse 

Of  births,  of  titles,  and  alliances  ; 

Of  marriages,  and  intermarriages  ; 

Relationship  remote,  or  near  of  kin  ; 

Of  friends  offended,  family  disgraced — 

Maiden  high-born,  but  wayward,  disobeying 

Parental  strict  injunction,  and  regardless 

Of  unmix'd  blood,  and  ancestry  remote, 

Stooping  to  wed  with  one  of  low  degree. 

But  these  are  not  thy  praises ;  and  I  wrong 

Thy  honour'd  memory,  recording  chiefly 

Things  light  or  trivial.     Better  'twere  to  tell, 

How  with  a  nobler  zeal  and  warmer  love 

She  served  her  heavenly  Master.      I  have  seen 

That  reverend  form  bent  down  with  age,  and  pain, 

And  rankling  malady.     Yet  not  for  this 

Ceased  she  to  praise  her  Maker,  or  withdrew 

Her  trust  in  him,  her  faith  and  humble  hope — 

So  meekly  had  she  learn'd  to  bear  her  cross — 

For  she  had  studied  patience  in  the  school 

Of  Christ,  much  comfort  she  had  thence  derived. 

And  was  a  follower  of  the  Nazarene. 


\ 


THE  SABBATH  BELLS. 

The  cheerful  Sabbath  bells,  wherever  heard. 

Strike  pleasant  on  the  sense,  most  like  the  voice 

Of  one  who,  from  the  far-off  hills,  proclaims 

Tidings  of  good  to  Zion  :   chiefly  when 

Their  piercing  tones  fall  sudden  on  the  ear 

Of  the  contemplant,  solitary  man. 

Whom  thoughts  abstruse  or  high  have  chanced  to  lure 

Forth  from  the  walks  of  men,  revolving  oft. 

And  oft  again,  hard  matter,  which  eludes 

And  baffles  his  pursuit — thought-sick,  and  tired 

Of  controversy,  where  no  end  appears. 

No  clew  to  his  research,  the  lonely  man 

Half  wishes  for  society  again. 

Him,  thus  engaged,  the  Sabbath  bells  salute 

Sudden  !  his  heart  awakes,  his  ears  drink  in 


I 


BLANK    VERSE.  359 


The  cheering  music  ;  his  relenting  soul 
Yearns  after  all  the  joys  of  social  life, 
And  softens  with  the  love  of  human  kind. 


FANCY  EMPLOYED  ON  DIVINE  SUBJECTS. 

The  truant  Fancy  was  a  wanderer  ever, 
A  lone  enthusiast  maid.     She  loves  to  walk 
In  the  bright  visions  of  empyreal  light, 
By  the  green  pastures  and  the  fragrant  meads, 
Where  tiie  perpetual  dowers  of  Eden  blow  ; 
By  crystal  streams  and  by  the  living  waters, 
Along  whose  margin  grows  the  wondrous  tree 
"Whose  leaves  shall  heal  the  nations  ;  underneath 
Whose  holy  shade  a  refuge  shall  be  found 
From  pain  and  want,  and  all  the  ills  that  wait 
On  mortal  life,  from  sin  and  death  for  ever. 


COMPOSED  AT  MIDNIGHT. 

From  broken  visions  of  perturbed  rest 

I  wake,  and  start,  and  fear  to  sleep  again. 

How  total  a  privation  of  all  sounds, 

Sights,  and  familiar  objects,  man,  bird,  beast. 

Herb,  tree,  or  flower,  and  prodigal  light  of  heaven 

'Twere  some  relief  to  catch  the  drowsy  cry 

Of  the  mechanic  watciiman,  or  the  noise 

Of  revel  reeling  home  from  midnight  cups. 

Those  are  the  moanings  of  lh(!  dying  man, 

AVho  lies  in  the  upper  chamber;   restless  moans. 

And  interrupted  only  by  a  cough 

Consumptive,  torturing  the  wastj^l  lungs. 

So  in  the  bitterness  of  death  he  lies, 

And  waits  in  anguish  for  the  morning's  light. 

What  can  that  do  for  him,  or  what  restore  ? 

Short  taste,  faint  sense,  afiecting  notices, 

And  little  images  of  pleasures  past, 

Of  health,  and  active  life— health  not  yet  slain. 


360  BLANK    VERSE. 

Nor  the  other  grace  of  life,  a  good  name,  sold 
For  sin's  black  wages.     On  his  tedious  bed 
He  writhes,  and  turns  him  from  the  accusing  light, 
And  finds  no  comfort  in  the  sun,  but  says, 
'*  When  night  comes  I  shall  get  a  little  rest." 
Some  few  groans  more,  death  comes,  and  there  an  end. 
'Tis  darkness  and  conjecture  all  beyond  ; 
"Weak  Nature  fears,  though  Charity  must  hope, 
And  Fancy,  most  licentious  on  such  themes, 
Where  decent  reverence  well  had  kept  her  mute, 
Hath  o'erstock'd  hell  with  devils,  and  brought  down, 
By  her  enormous  fablings  and  mad  lies, 
Discredit  on  the  gospel's  serious  truths 
And  salutary  fears.     The  man  of  parts, 
Poet,  or  prose  declaimer,  on  his  couch 
Lolling,  like  one  indiiferent,  fabricates 
A  heaven  of  gold,  where  he,  and  such  as  he. 
Their  heads  encompass'd  with  crowns,  their  heels 
With  fine  wings  garlanded,  shall  tread  the  stars 
Beneath  their  feet,  heaven's  pavement,  far  removed 
*    From  damn'd  spirits,  and  the  torturing  cries 
Of  men,  his  breth'ren,  fashioned  of  the  earth. 
As  he  was,  nourish'd  with  the  selfsame  bread, 
Belike  his  kindred  or  companions  once — 
Through  everlasting  ages  now  divorced, 
In  chains  and  savage  torments  to  repent 
Short  years  of  folly  on  earth.     Their  groans  unheard 
In  heav'n,  the  saint  nor  pity  feels,  nor  care, 
For  those  thus  sentenced — pity  might  disturb 
The  delicate  sense  and  most  divine  repose 
Of  spirits  angelical.     Bless'd  be  God, 
The  measure  of  his  judgments  is  not  fixed 
By  man's  erroneous  standard.     He  discerns 
No  such  inordinate  difference  and  vast 
Between  the  sinner  and  the  saint,  to  doom 
Such  disproportion'd  fates.     Compared  with  him, 
No  man  on  earth  is  holy  called  :  they  best 
Stand  in  his  sight  approved  who  at  his  feet 
Their  little  crowns  of  virtue  cast,  and  yield 
To  him  of  his  own  works  the  praise,  his  due. 


JOHN    WOODVIL. 


A    TRAGEDY 


CHARACTERS. 


Sir  Walter  Woodvil. 

John.      )  ,• 

CI  /  nis  sons. 

Simon.    ) 

p  *   ?  pretended  friends  of  John. 

Sandford.      Sir  Walter'^s  old  steward. 
Margaret.      OrpJiun  ward  of  Sir  Walter. 
Four  Gentlemen.     John^s  riotous  companions. 
Servants. 


i^'cene —ybr  the  most  part  at  Sir  Walter^ s  mansion  in  Dev 
onshire  ;  at  other  times  in  the  forest  of  Sherwood. 

Time — soon  after  the  Restoration. 


JOHN     W  O  O  D  V  I  L. 


ACT  THE  FIRST. 


Scene. — A  Servant's  Apartment  in  Woodvil  Hall. — Servants 
drinking. —  Time,  the  viorning. 

A  Song,  by  Daniel. 
"  When  the  king  enjoys  his  own  again." 

Peter. — A  delicate  song.     Where  didst  learn  it,  fellow? 

Daniel. — Even  there  where  thou  learnest  thy  oaths  and 
lliy  politics — at  our  masters  table.  Where  else  should  a 
serving-man  pick  u[)  his  poor  accomplishments  ? 

Martin. — Well  spoken,  Daniel.  Oh,  rare  Daniel  ! — his 
oaths  and  his  politics  !  excellent ! 

Francis. — And  where  didst  pick  up  thy  knavery,  Daniel? 

Peter. — That  came  to  him  by  inlieritance.  His  family 
have  supplied  the  shire  of  Devon  time  out  of  mind  with 
good  thieves  and  bad  serving-men.  All  of  his  race  have 
come  into  the  world  without  their  conscience. 

Martin. — Good  thieves  and  bad  serving-men  !  Better  and 
better.      I  marvel  what  Daniel  hath  got  to  say  in  reply. 

Daniel. — I  marvel  more  whcr»  thou  wilt  say  anything  to  the 
purpose,  thou  shallow  serving-man,  whose  swiftest  conceit 
carries  thee  no  higher  than  to  apprehend  with  difficult v  the 
stale  jests  of  us  thy  compeers.  Wlien  was't  ever  known  to 
club  thy  own  particular  jest  among  us  ? 

Martin. — Most  unkind  Daniel,  to  speak  such  biting  things 
of  me  ! 

Francis. — See — if  he  hath  not  brought  tears  into  the  poor 
fellow's  eyes  with  the  saltness  of  his  rebuke  ! 

Daniel. — No  offence,  brotlier  .Martin — I  meant  none.  'Tis 
true,  Heaven  gives  gifts,  and  withholds  them.  It  has  been 
pleased  to  bestow  upon  me  a  nimble  invention  to  the  manu- 
facture of  a  jest ;  and  upon  thee,  Martin,  an  indill'ercnt  bad 
capacity  to  understand  my  meaning. 

Martin. — Is  that  all  ?     I  am  content.     Here's  my  hand. 

Q2 


364  A    TRAGEDY. 

Francis. — Well,  I  like  a  little  innocent  mirth  myself,  but 
never  could  endure  bawdry. 

Daniel. —  Quod  homines  tot  sententicB. 

Martin. — And  what  is  that? 

Daniel. — 'Tis  Greek,  and  argues  difference  of  opinion. 

Martin. — I  hope  there  is  none  between  us. 

Daniel. — Here's  to  thee,  brother  Martin.  [Drinks.) 

Martin. — And  to  thee,  Daniel.  [Drinks.) 

Francis. — And  to  thee,  Peter.  (Drinks.) 

Peter. — Thank  you,  Francis.    And  here's  to  thee.    [Drinks.) 

Martin. — I  shall  be  fuddled  anon. 

Daniel. — And  drunkenness  I  hold  to  be  a  very  despicable 
vice. 

All. — Oh!  a  shocking  vice.  [They  drink  round.) 

Peter. — Inasmuch  as  it  taketh  away  the  understanding. 

Daniel. — And  makes  the  eyes  red. 

Peter. — And  the  tongue  to  stammer. 

Daniel. — And  to  blab  out  secrets. 

{During  this  conversation  they  continue  drinking.) 

Peter. — Some  men  do  not  know  an  enemy  from  a  friend 
when  they  are  drunk. 

Daniel. — Certainly,  sobriety  is  the  health  of  the  soul. 

Martin. — Now  I  know  I  am  going  to  be  drunk. 

Daniel. — How  canst  tell,  drybones  ? 

Martin. — Because  I  begin  to  be  melancholy.  That's  al- 
ways a  sign. 

Francis. — Take  care  of  Martin  ;  he'll  topple  off  his  seat 
else.  [Martin  drops  asleep.) 

Peter. — Times  are  greatly  altered  since  young  master  took 
upon  himself  the  government  of  this  household. 

All. — Greatly  altered. 

Francis. — I  think  everything  be  altered  for  the  better  since 
his  majesty's  blessed  restoration. 

Peter.  — \n  Sir  Walter's  days  there  was  no  encouragement 
given  to  good  housekeeping. 

All. — None. 

Daniel. — For  instance,  no  possibility  of  getting  drunk  be- 
fore two  in  the  afternoon. 

Peter. — Every  man  his  allowance  of  ale  at  breakfast — his 
quart ! 

All. — A  quart !  !  [In  derision.) 

Daniel. — Nothing  left  to  our  own  sweet  discretions. 

Peter. — Whereby  it  may  appear  we  were  treated  more  like 
beasts  than  what  we  were — discreet  and  reasonable  serving- 
men. 

All. — Like  beasts. 


A    TRAGEDY.  365 

Martin. — {Opening  his  eyes.)  Like  beasts. 
Daniel. — To  sleep,  wagtail  ! 

Francis. — I  marvel  all  this  while  where  the  old  gentleman 
has  found  means  to  secrete  himself.  It  seems  no  man  has 
heard  of  him  since  the  day  of  the  king's  return.  Can  any 
tell  why  our  young  master,  being  favoured  by  the  court,  should 
not  have  interest  to  procure  his  father's  pardon  ? 

Daniel. — Marry,  1  think  'tis  the  obstinacy  of  the  old  knight, 
that  will  not  be  beholden  to  the  court  for  his  safety. 

Martin. — Now  that  is  wilful. 

Francis. — But  can  any  tell  me  the  place  of  his  conceal- 
ment ? 

Peter. — That  cannot  I ;  but  I  have  my  conjectures. 

Daniel. — Two  hundred  pounds,  as  I  hear,  to  the  man  that 
shall  apprehend  him. 

Francis. — Well,  I  have  my  suspicions. 

Peter. — And  so  have  I. 

Martin. — And  I  can  keep  a  secret. 

Francis. — ( To  Peter.)     Warwickshire,  you  mean.  {Aside.) 

Peter. — Perhaps  not. 

Francis. — Nearer,  perhaps. 

Peter. — I  say  nothing. 

Daniel. — I  hope  there  is  none  in  this  company  would  be 
mean  enough  to  betray  him. 

All. — Oh  Lord;  surely  not. 

{Tliey  drink  to  Sir  Walter'' s  safHy.) 

Francis. — I  have  often  wondered  how  our  master  came  to 
be  excepted  by  name  in  the  late  Act  of  Oblivion. 

Daniel. — Shall  I  tell  the  reason? 

7l//.— Ay,  do. 

Daniel. — 'Tis  thought  he  is  no  great  friend  to  the  present 
happy  establishment. 

All. — Oh  !   monstrous  ! 

Peter. — Fellow-servants,  a  thouglit  strikes  me.  Do  we,  or 
do  we  not,  come  under  the  penalties  of  the  treason-act,  by 
reason  of  our  being  privy  to  this  man's  concealment  ? 

All. — Truly,  a  sad  consideration. 

To  them  enters  Sandford  suddenly. 

Sandford. — You  wcll-fcd  and  unprofitable  grooms, 
Mamlaincd  for  slate,  not  use  ; 
You  lazy  fcasters  at  another's  cost. 
That  eat  like  maggots  into  an  estate, 
And  do  as  little  work, 
Being  indeed  but  foul  excrescences, 
31* 


366  A   TRAGEDY. 

And  no  just  parts  in  a  well-order'd  family ; 
You  base  and  rascal  imitators, 
Who  act  up  to  the  height  your  master's  vices, 
But  cannot  read  his  virtues  in  your  bond  : 
Which  of  you,  as  I  enter'd,  spake  of  betraying  ? 
Was  it  you,  or  you,  or,  thin  face,  was  it  you? 

Martin. — Whom  does  he  call  thin  face  ? 

Sandford. — No  prating,  loon,  but  tell  me  who  he  was. 
That  I  may  brain  the  villain  with  my  staff 
That  seeks  Sir  Walter's  life  ! 
You  miserable  men, 

With  minds  more  slavish  than  your  slave's  estate, 
Have  you  that  noble  bounty  so  forgot. 
Which  took  you  from  the  looms  and  from  the  ploughs, 
Which  better  had  ye  follow'd,  fed  ye,  clothed  ye, 
And  entertain'd  ye  in  a  worthy  service, 
Where  your  best  wages  was  the  world's  repute. 
That  thus  ye  seek  his  life,  by  whom  ye  live  ? 
Have  you  forgot,  too, 
How  often  in  old  times 

Your  drunken  mirths  have  stunn'd  day's  sober  ears, 
Carousing  full  cups  to  Sir  Walter's  health  ? 
Whom  now  ye  would  betray,  but  that  he  lie 
Out  of  the  reach  of  your  poor  treacheries. 
This  learn  from  me  ; 

Our  master's  secret  sleeps  with  trustier  tongues 
Than  will  unlock  themselves  to  carls  like  you. 
Go,  get  you  gone,  you  knaves.     Who  stirs  ?  this  staff 
Shall  teach  you  better  manners  else. 

All. — Well,  we  are  going. 

Sandford. — And  quickly,  too,  ye  had  better,  for  I  see 
Young  mistress  Margaret  coming  this  way. 

(^Exeunt  all  hut  Sandford,) 

Enter  Margaret^  as  in  a  fright,  pursued  by  a  gentleman^  who, 
seeing  Sandford,  retires,  muttering  a  curse. 

SANDFORD.       MARGARET. 

Sandford. — Good-morrow  to  my  fair  mistress.     'Twas  a 
chance 
I  saw  you,  lady,  so  intent  was  I 
On  chiding  hence  these  graceless  serving-men, 
Who  cannot  break  their  fast  at  morning  meals 
Without  debauch  and  mistimed  riotings. 
This  house  hath  been  a  scene  of  nothing  else 


A  TRAGEDY.  367 

But  atheist  riot  and  profane  excess, 

Since  my  old  master  quitted  all  his  rights  here. 

Margaret. — Each  day  I  endure  fresh  insult  from  the  scorn 
Of  Woodvil's  friends,  the  uncivil  jests 
And  free  discourses  of  the  dissolute  men 
That  haunt  this  mansion,  making  me  their  mirth. 

Sandford. — Does  my  young  master  know  of  these  affronts  ? 

Margaret. — I  cannot  tell.      Perhaps  he  has  not  been  told. 
Perhaps  he  might  have  seen  them,  if  he  would. 
I  have  known  him  more  quick-sighted.     Let  thai  pass. 
All  things  seem  changed,  I  think.     I  had  a  friend — 
(I  can't  but  weep  to  think  him  alter'd  too,) 
These  things  are  best  forgotten  ;  but  I  knew 
A  man,  a  young  man,  young,  and  full  of  honour, 
That  would  have  pick'd  a  quarrel  for  a  straw, 
And  fought  it  out  to  the  extremity, 
E'en  with  the  dearest  friend  he  had  alive, 
On  but  a  bare  surmise,  a  possibility 
That  Margaret  had  suffer'd  an  affront. 
Some  are  too  tame  that  were  too  splenetic  once. 

Sandford. — 'Twere  best  he  should  be  told  of  these  affronts. 

Margaret. — I  am  the  daughter  of  his  father's  friend — 
Sir  Walter's  orphan  ward. 
I  am  not  his  servant-maid,  that  I  should  wait 
The  opportunity  of  a  gracious  hearing, 
Inquire  the  times  and  seasons  when  to  put 
My  peevish  prayer  up  at  young  Woodvil's  feet, 
And  sue  to  him  for  slow  redress,  who  was 
Himself  a  suiter  late  to  Margaret. 
I  am  somewhat  proud  :   and  VVoodvil  taught  me  pride. 
1  was  his  favourite  once,  his  playfellow  in  infancy, 
And  joyful  mistress  of  his  youth. 
None  once  so  pleasant  in  his  eyes  as  Margaret. 
His  conscience,  his  religion,  Margaret  was  ; 
His  dear  heart's  confessor,  a  heart  within  that  heart, 
And  all  dear  things  sumni'd  up  in  her  alone. 
As  Margaret  smiled  or  frown'd  John  lived  or  died  ; 
His  dress,  speech,  gesture,  studies,  friendships,  all 
Being  fashion'd  to  her  liking. 
His  flatteries  taught  me  first  this  self-esteem, 
His  flatteries  and  caresses  while  he  loved.  ^ 

The  world  esteemed  her  happy,  who  had  won 
His  heart,  who  won  all  hearts  ; 
And  ladies  envied  me  the  love  of  Woodvil. 

Sandford. — He  doth  affect  the  courtier's  life  too  much, 
Whose  art  is  to  forget ; 


368  A    TRAGEDY. 

And  that  has  wrought  this  seeming  change  in  him, 

That  was  by  nature  noble. 

'Tis  these  court-plagues,  that  swarm  about  our  house, 

Have  done  the  mischief,  making  his  fancy  giddy 

With  images  of  state,  preferment,  place, 

Tainting  his  generous  spirits  with  ambition. 

Margaret. — I  know  not  how  it  is  ; 
A  cold  protector  is  John  grown  to  me. 
The  mistress  and  presumptive  wife  of  Woodvil 
Can  never  stoop  so  low  to  supplicate 
A  man,  her  equal,  to  redress  those  wrongs 
Which  he  was  bound  first  to  prevent. 
But  which  his  own  neglects  have  sanction'd  rather, 
Both  sanction'd  and  provoked  :  a  mark'd  neglect. 
And  strangeness  fast'ning  bitter  on  his  love, 
His  love  which  long  has  been  upon  the  wane. 
For  me,  I  am  determined  what  to  do : 
To  leave  this  house  this  night,  and  lukewarm  John, 
And  trust  for  food  to  the  earth  and  Providence. 

Sandford. — Oh,  lady,  have  a  care 
Of  these  indefinite  and  spleenbred  resolves. 
You  know  not  half  the  dangers  that  attend 
Upon  a  life  of  wand'ring,  which  your  thoughts  now, 
Feeling  the  swellings  of  a  lofty  anger. 
To  your  abused  fancy,  as  'tis  likely, 
Portray  without  its  terrors,  painting  lies 
And  representments  of  fallacious  liberty — 
You  know  not  what  it  is  to  leave  the  roof  that  shelters  you. 

Margaret. — I  have  thought  on  every  possible  event. 
The  dangers  and  discouragements  you  speak  of, 
Even  till  my  woman's  heart  hath  ceased  to  fear  them, 
And  cowardice  grows  enamour'd  of  rare  accidents. 
Nor  am  I  so  unfurnish'd  as  you  think 
Of  practical  schemes. 

Sandford. — Now  God   forbid  ;    think   twice  of  this,  dear 

lady. 
Margaret. — I  pray  you  spare  me,  Mr.  Sandford, 
And  once  for  all  believe,  nothing  can  shake  my  purpose. 
Sandford. — But  what  course  have  you  thought  on  ? 
Margaret. — To  seek  Sir  Walter  in  the  forest  of  Sherwood. 
I  have  letters  from  young  Simon, 
Acquainting  me  with  all  the  circumstances 
Of  their  concealment,  place,  and  manner  of  life. 
And  the  merry  hours  they  spend  in  the  green  haunts 
Of  Sherwood,  nigh  which  place  they  have  ta'en  a  house 
In  the  town  of  Nottingham,  and  pass  for  foreigners, 


A     TRAGEDY.  3(39 

Wearing  the  dress  of"  Frenchmen. 

All  which  1  have  perused  with  so  attent 

And  child-like  longings,  thai  to  my  doting  ears 

Two  sounds  now  seem  like  one, 

One  meaning  in  two  words,  Sherwood  and  liberty. 

And,  gentle  Mr.  Sandtbrd, 

'Tis  you  that  must  provide  now 

The  means  of  my  departure,  which,  for  safety, 

Must  be  in  boy's  apparel. 

Sanclford. — Since  you  will  have  it  so, 
(My  careful  age  trembles  at  all  may  happen,) 
I  will  engage  to  furnish  you. 
I  have  the  keys  of  the  wardrobe,  and  can  fit  you 
With  garments  to  your  size. 
I  know  a  suit 

Of  lively  Lincoln  green,  that  shall  much  grace  you 
In  the  wear,  being  glossy  fresh,  and  worn  but  seldom. 
Young  Stephen  Woodvil  wore  them  while  he  lived. 
I  have  the  keys  of  all  this  house  and  passages, 
And  ere  daybreak  will  rise  and  let  you  forth. 
What  things  soe'er  you  have  need  of  I  can  furnish  you  ; 
And  will  provide  a  horse  and  trusty  guide. 
To  bear  you  on  your  way  to  Nottingham. 

Margaret. — That  once  this  day  and  night  were  fairly  past ! 
For  tlien  I'll  bid  this  house  and  love  farewell ; 
Farewell,  sweet  Devon;   farewell,  lukewarm  John; 
For  with  the  morning's  light  will  Margaret  be  gone. 
Thanks,  courteous  Mr.  Sandford. 

(^Exeunt  divers  ivai/,s\) 


ACT  THE  SECOND. 

Scene — An  Apartment  in  Woodvil  Hall. 

.ToiiN   Woodvil — alone. 

[Reading  part. f  of  a  letter.) 

*' When  love  grows  cold,  and  imhUcrcnco  has  usurped  upon 
old  esteem,  it  is  no  marvel  if  the  world  bcijin  to  account  f/iat 
dependance  which  hitherto  lias  Ijccn  (stcfMiicd  lionourable 
shelter.  'I'he  course  1  have  taken  (in  Icjivinij  this  house,  not 
easily  wrought  thereunto)  seemed  to  me  best  for  the  once- 

Q  3 


370  A    TRAGEDY. 

for-all  releasing  of  yourself  (who,  in  times  past,  have  deserved 
w^ell  of  me)  from  the  now  daily  and  not-to-be-endured  tribute 
of  forced  love  and  ill-dissembled  reluctance  of  affection. 

,  "  Margaret." 

Gone  !  gone  !  my  girl  ?  so  hasty,  Margaret  ? 

And  never  a  kiss  at  parting?  shallow  loves, 

And  likings  of  a  ten  days'  growth,  use  courtesies, 

And  show  red  eyes  at  parting.     Who  bids  "  farewell" 

In  the  same  tone  he  cries  "  God  speed  you,  sir?" 

Or  tells  of  joyful  victories  at  sea, 

Where  he  hath  ventures  ?  does  not  rather  muffle 

His  organs  to  emit  a  leaden  sound, 

To  suit  the  melancholy  dull  "  farewell," 

Which  they  in  heaven  not  use  ? — 

So  peevish,  Margaret  ? 

But  'tis  the  common  error  of  your  sex. 

When  our  idolatry  slackens,  or  grows  less, 

(As  who  of  woman  born  can  keep  his  faculty 

Of  admiration,  being  a  decaying  faculty. 

For  ever  strain'd  to  the  pitch  1  or  can  at  pleasure 

Make  it  renewable,  as  some  appetites  are. 

As,  namely,  hunger,  thirst?)  this  being  the  case, 

They  tax  us  with  neglect,  and  love  grown  cold, 

Coin  plainings  of  the  perfidy  of  men, 

Which  into  maxims  pass,  and  apothegms 

To  be  retailed  in  ballads. 

I  know  them  all. 
They  are  jealous  when  our  larger  hearts  receive 
More  guests  than  one.     (Love  in  a  woman's  heart 
Being  all  in  one.)     For  me,  I  am  sure  I  have  room  here 
For  more  disturbers  of  my  sleep  than  one. 
Love  shall  have  part,  but  Love  shall  not  have  all. 
Ambition,  Pleasure,  Vanity,  all  by  turns. 
Shall  lie  in  my  bed,  and  keep  me  fresh  and  waking ; 
Yet  Love  not  be  excluded.     Foolish  wench, 
I  could  have  loved  her  twenty  years  to  come, 
And  still  have  kept  my  liking.     But  since  'tis  so, 
Why,  fare  thee  well,  old  playfellow  !     I'll  try 
To  squeeze  a  tear  for  old  acquaintance'  sake. 
I  shall  not  grudge  so  much. 

To  him  enters  Lovel. 

Lovel. — Bless  us,  Woodvil !  what  is  the  matter?    I  protest, 
man,  I  thought  you  had  been  weeping. 


\ 


A    TRAGEDY.  371 

Woodvil. — Nothing    is    the    maitrr,  only   the    wench  has 
forced  some  water  into  my  eyes,  which  will  quickly  disband. 

Lovel. — I  cannot  conceive  you. 

Woodvil. — Margaret  is  flown. 

Lovel. — Upon  what  pretence  ? 

Woodvil. — Neglect  on  my  part :  which  it  seems  she  has 
had  the  wit  to  discover,  maugre  all  my  pains  to  conceal  it. 

Lovel. — Then  you  confess  the  charge  ? 

Woodvil. — To  say  the  truth,  my  love  for  her  has  of  late 
stopped  short  on  this  side  idolatry. 

Lovel. — As  all  good  Christians'  should,  I  think. 

Woodvil. — I  am  sure,  I  could  have  loved  her  still  within 
the  limits  of  warrantable  love. 

Lovel. — A  kind  of  brotherly  affection,  I  take  it. 

Woodvil. — We  should  have  made  excellent  man  and  wife 
in  time. 

Lovel. — A  good  old  couple,  when  the  snows  fell,  to  crowd 
about  a  sea-coal  fire,  and  talk  over  old  matters. 

Woodvil. — While  each  should  feel,  what  neither  cared  to 
acknowledge,  that  stories  oft  repeated  may,  at  last,  come  to 
lose  some  of  their  grace  by  the  repetition. 

Lovel. — Which  both  of  you  may  yet  live  long  enough  to 
discover.  For,  take  my  word  for  it,  Margaret  is  a  bird  that 
will  come  back  to  you  without  a  lure. 

Woodvil. — Never,  never,  Lovel.  Spite  of  my  levity,  with 
tears  1  confess  it,  she  was  a  lady  of  most  confirmed  honour, 
of  an  unmatchable  spirit,  and  determinaio  in  all  virtuous  reso- 
lutions ;  not  hasty  to  anticipate  an  affront,  nor  slow  to  feel 
where  just  provocation  was  given. 

Lovel. — What  made  you  neglect  her,  then  ? 

Woodvil. — Mere  levity  and  youthfulnebs  of  blood — a  malady 
incident  to  young  men — physicians  call  it  caprice.  Nothing 
else.  He  that  slighted  her  knew  her  value  :  and  'tis  odds 
but,  for  thy  sake,  Margaret,  John  will  yet  go  to  his  grave  a 
bachelor.  (A  noise  heard.,  as  of  one  drunk  and  singing.) 

Lovel. — Here  comes  one  that  will  quickly  dissip;ite  these 
humours.  (  Entrr  one  drunk.) 

Drunken  Man. — Good-morrow  to  you,  gentleineu.  Mr. 
Lovel,  I  am  your  humble  .servant.  Honest  Jack  W  ixtdvil,  I 
will  get  drunk  with  you  to-morrow. 

Woodvil. — And  why  to-morrow,  honest  Mr.  Freeman? 

Drunken  Man. —  I  scent  a  traitor  in  tliat  question.  A  beastly 
question.  Is  it  not  his  majesty's  birlh(hiy  ?  tlie  day,  of  all 
days  in  the  year,  on  which  King  C/harles  the  Second  was  gra- 
ciously pleased  to  l)c  born.  {Sings.)  "  Great  pity  'tis  such 
days  as  those  should  come  but  once  a  year." 


372  A    TRAGEDY. 

Lovel. — Drunk  in  a  morning !  foh !  how  he  stinks  ! 

Drunken  Man. — And  why  not  drunk  in  a  morning?  canst 
tell,  bully? 

Woodvil. — Because,  being  the  sweet  and  tender  infancy  ot 
the  day,  methinks  it  should  ill  endure  such  early  blightings. 

Drunken  Man. — I  grant  you,  'tis  in  some  sort  the  youth  and 
lender  nonage  of  the  day.  Youth  is  bashful,  and  1  give  it  a 
cup  to  encourage  it.  [Sings)  "  Ale  that  will  make  Grinialkiii 
prate."  At  noon  I  drink  for  thirst ;  at  night  for  fellov.'ship  ; 
but,  above  all,  I  love  to  usher  in  the  bashful  morning  under 
the  auspices  of  a  freshening  stoop  of  liquor.  {!Sings)  "Ale 
in  a  Saxon  rumkin,  then,  makes  valour  burgeon  in  tall  men." 
But,  I  crave  pardon.  I  fear  1  keep  that  gentleman  from  se- 
rious thoughts.  There  be  those  that  wait  for  me  in  the 
cellar. 

Woodvil. — Who  are  they? 

Drunken  Man. — Gentleman,  my  good  friends,  Cleveland, 
Delaval,  and  Turby,  I  know  by  this  time  they  are  all  clam- 
orous for  me.  [Exit  singing.) 

Woodvil. — This  keeping  of  open  house  acquaints  a  man 
with  strange  companions. 

[Enter,  at  another  door,  three,  calling  for  Harry  Freeman.) 
Harry  Freeman,  Harry  Freeman. 
He  is  not  here.     Let  us  go  look  for  him. 
Where  is  Freeman? 
Where  is  Hatry  ?       [Exeunt  the  three,  calling  for  Freeman.) 

Woodvil.  —  Did  you  ever  see  such  gentry?  [laughing) 
These  are  thev  that  fatten  on  ale  and  tobacco  in  a  morning-, 
drink  burnt  brandy  at  noon  to  promote  digestion,  and  piously 
conclude  with  quart  bumpers  after  supper,  to  prove  their 
loyalty. 

Lovel. — Come,  shall  we  adjourn  to  the  Tennis  Court? 

Woodvil. — No,  you  shall  go  with  me  into  the  gallery,  where 
I  will  show  you  the  Vandyke  I  have  purchased.  "  The  late 
king  taking  leave  of  his  children." 

Lovel. — I  will  but  adjust  my  dress,  and  attend  you. 

[Exit  Lovel.) 

John  Woodvil. — {alone)  Now  Universal   England  getteth 
drunk, 
For  joy  that  Charles,  her  monarch,  is  restored  : 
And  she,  that  some  time  wore  a  saintly  mask, 
'I'he  stale-grown  visor  from  her  face  doth  pluck. 
And  weareth  now  a  suit  of  morris-bells, 
With  which  she  jingling  goes  through  all  her  towns  and  vil- 
lages. 
The  baffled  factions  in  their  houses  skulk ; 


A    TRAGEDY.  373 

The  commonwealtlismaii  and  slate  machinist, 

The  cropp'd  fanatic  and  fifth-monarchy-man, 

Who  heareth  of  these  visionaries  now? 

They  and  their  dreams  have  ended.     Fools  do  sing 

Where  good  men  yield  God  thanks  ;  but  politic  spirits, 

Who  live  by  observation,  note  these  changes 

Of  the  popular  mind,  and  thereby  serve  their  ends. 

Then  why  not  I  ?     What's  Charles  to  me,  or  Oliver, 

But  as  my  own  advancement  hangs  on  one  of  them  ? 

I  to  myself  am  chief.     I  know 

Some  shallow  mouths  cry  out  that  I  am  smit 

With  the  gauds  and  show  of  state,  the  point  of  place 

And  trick  of  precedence,  the  ducks  and  nods 

Which  weak  minds  pay  to  rank.     'Tis  not  to  sit 

In  place  of  worship  at  the  royal  masks 

Their  pastimes,  plays,  and  Whitehall  banquetings  ; 

For  none  of  these, 

Nor  yet  to  be  seen  whispering  with  some  great  one, 

Do  I  alfect  the  favours  of  the  court. 

I  would  be  great,  for  greatness  hath  great  poicer, 

And  that's  the  fruit  I  reach  at. 

Great  spirits  ask  great  play-room.     Who  could  sit 

AVilh  these  prophetic  swellings  in  my  breast. 

That  prick  and  goad  me  on,  and  never  cease. 

To  the  fortunes  something  tells  me  I  was  born  to  ? 

Who,  with  such  monitors  witliin  to  stir  him, 

Would  sit  him  down,  with  lazy  arms  across, 

A  unit,  a  thing  without  a  name  in  the  state, 

A  something  to  be  govern'd — not  to  govern, 

A  fishing,  hawking,  hunting,  country  gentleman  ?  (Exit.) 


Scene — Sherwood  Forest. 

SIR    WALTER    WOODVIL.  SIMON    WOODVIL. 

Disguised  (is  Frenclnncn. 

Sir    Walter. — How    fares    my    boy,    Simon,   my  youngest 
horn. 
My  ho])e,  my  pride,  young  Woodvil,  speak  to  mo  ? 
Some  grief  untold  weighs  heavy  at  thy  heart : 
I  know  it  by  thy  altered  cheer  of  late. 
Thinkest  tliy  brother  plays  thy  father  false? 
It  is  a  mad  and  thriftless  j)rodigal. 
Grown  proud  upon  the  favours  of  the  court  ; 
Court  manners  and  court  fashions  he  affects, 
32 


374  A       RAGEDY. 

And  in  the  heat  and  uncheck'd  blood  of  youth 

Harbours  a  company  of  riotous  men, 

All  hot  and  young,  court-seekers,  Like  himself, 

Most  skilful  to  devour  a  patrimony ; 

And  these  have  eat  into  my  old  estates. 

And  these  have  drain'd  thy  father's  cellars  dry ; 

But  these  so  common  faults  of  youth  not  named, 

(Things  which  themselves  outgrow^,  left  te  themselves,) 

I  know  no  quality  that  stains  his  honour. 

My  life  upon  his  faith  and  noble  mind, 

Son  John  could  never  play  thy  father  false. 

Simon. — I  never  thought  but  nobly  of  my  brother, 

Touching  his  honour  and  fidelity. 

Still  I  could  wish  him  charier  of  his  person, 

And  of  his  time  more  frugal,  than  to  spend 

In  riotous  living,  graceless  society, 

And  mirth  unpalatable,  hours  better  employed 

(With  those  persuasive  graces  nature  lent  him) 
In  fervent  pleadings  for  a  father's  life. 

Sir  Walter. — I  would  not  ow^e  my  life  to  a  jealous  court, 
Whose  sliallow  policy  I  know  it  is. 
On  some  reluctant  acts  of  prudent  mercy, 
(Not  voluntary,  but  extorted  by  the  times. 
In  the  first  tremblings  of  new-fix'd  power, 
And  recollection  smarting  from  old  wounds,) 
On  these  to  build  a  spurious  popularity. 
Unknowing  what  free  grace  or  mercy  mean, 
They  fear  to  punish,  therefore  do  they  pardon. 
For  this  cause  have  I  oft  forbid  my  son, 
By  letters,  overtures,  open  solicitings, 
Or  closet-tamperings,  by  gold  or  fee, 
To  beg  or  bargain  with  the  court  for  my  life. 

Simon. — And  John  has  ta'en  you,  father,  at  your  word, 
True  to  the  letter  of  his  paternal  charge. 

Sir  Walter. — Well,   my   good    cause   and  my  good   con- 
science, boy. 
Shall  be  for  sons  to  me,  if  John  prove  false. 
Men  die  but  once,  and  the  opportunity 
Of  a  noble  death  is  not  an  every-day  fortune  : 
It  is  a  gift  which  noble  spirits  pray  for. 

Simon. — I  would  not  wrong  my  brother  by  surmise ; 
I  know  him  generous,  full  of  gentle  qualities, 
Incapable  of  base  compliances. 
No  prodigal  in  his  nature,  but  affecting 
This  show  of  bravery  for  ambitious  ends. 
He  drinks,  for  'tis  the  humour  of  the  court, 


A.    TRAGEDY.  375 

And  drink  may  one  day  wrest  the  secret  from  him, 
And  pluck  you  from  your  hiding-phice  in  the  sequel. 

Sir  Walter. — Fair  death  shall  be   my  doom,  and  foul  life 
his. 
Till  when,  we'll  live  as  free  in  this  green  forest 
As  yonder  deer,  who  roam  nnfearino  treason  ; 
AVho  seem  the  aborigines  of  this  place, 
Or  Sherwood  theirs  by  tenure. 

Simon. — 'Tis  said  that  Robert,  Earl  of  Huntingdon, 
Men  caird  him  Robin  Hood,  an  outlaw  bold, 
With  a  merry  crew  of  hunters  here  did  haunt. 
Not  sparing  the  king's  venison.      May  one  believe 
The  antique  tale  ? 

Sir  Walter. — There  is  much  likelihood 
Such  bandits  did  in  England  erst  abound, 
When  polity  was  young.     I  have  read  of  the  pranks 
Of  that  mad  archer,  and  of  the  tax  he  levied 
On  travellers,  whatever  their  degree, 
Baron  or  knight,  whoever  pass'd  these  woods, 
Layman  or  priest,  not  sparing  the  bishop's  mitre 
For  spiritual  regards  ;   nay,  once,  'tis  said, 
He  robb'd  the  king  himself. 

Simon. — A  perilous  man.  [.'tmiling.) 

Sir  Walter. — How  quietly  we  live  here, 
Unread  in  the  world's  business. 
And  take  no  note  of  all  its  slippery  changes. 
'Twere  best  we  make  a  world  among  ourselves, 
A  little  world, 

Without  the  ills  and  falsehood  of  the  greater ; 
We  two  being  all  the  inhabitants  of  ours, 
And  kings  and  subjects  both  in  one. 

Simon. — Only  the  dangerous  errors,  fond  conceits, 
Which  make  the  business  of  that  greater  world, 
Must  have  no  place  in  ours  : 

As,  namely,  riches,  honours,  birth,  place,  courtesy. 
Good  fame  and  bad,  rumours  and  popular  noises, 
Books,  creeds,  opinions,  prejudices  national, 
Humours  particular, 

Soul-killing  lies,  and  truliis  liiat  work  sn)all  good. 
Feuds,  factions,  enmities,  relationships, 
Loves,  hatreds,  sym[)athies,  antipathies, 
And  all  the  intricate  stufl' ([uarrels  arc  made  of. 

(.Margaret  enters  in  boy's  apparel.) 

Sir  Walter. — What  pretty  boy  have  we  here  ? 

Margaret.  —  Bon  jour,  messieurs.    Ye  have  handsome  Eng- 
lish faces ; 


376  A    TRAGEDY. 

I  should  have  ta'en  you  else  for  other  two 
I  came  to  seek  in  the  forest. 

Sir  Walter. — Who  are  they  1 

Margaret. — A   gallant  brace   of   Frenchmen,   curled  mon- 
sieurs, 
That,  men  say,  haunt  these  woods,  affecting  privacy. 
More  than  the  manner  of  their  countrymen. 

Simon. — AVe  have  here  a  wonder. 
The  face  is  Margaret's  face. 

Sir  Walter. — The  face   is  Margaret's,   but  the   dress   the 
same 
My  Stephen  sometimes  wore. 

(To  Margaret.) 
Suppose  us  them  ;  whom  do  men  say  we  are  ? 
Or  know  you  what  you  seek  ? 

Margaret. — A  worthy  pair  of  exiles. 
To  whom  the  politics  of  state  revenge, 
In  final  issue  of  long  civil  broils. 
Have  houseless  driven  from  your  native  France, 
To  wander  idle  in  these  English  woods. 
Where  now  ye  live  ;  most  part 
Thinking  on  home  and  all  the  joys  of  France, 
Where  grows  the  purple  vine. 

Sir  Walter. — These  woods,  young  stranger, 
And  grassy  pastures,  which  the  slim  deer  loves. 
Are  they  less  beauteous  than  the  land  of  France, 
Where  grows  the  purple  vine  ? 

Margaret. — I  cannot  tell. 
To  an  indifferent  eye  both  show  alike. 
'Tis  not  the  scene. 
But  all  familiar  objects  in  the  scene. 
Which  now  ye  miss,  that  constitute  a  difference. 
Ye  had  a  country,  exiles,  ye  have  none  now : 
Friends  had  ye,  and  much  wealth,  ye  now  have  nothing; 
Our  manners,  laws,  our  customs,  all  are  foreign  to  you, 
I  know  ye  loathe  them,  cannot  learn  them  readily  ; 
And  there  is  reason,  exiles,  ye  should  love 
Our  English  earth  less  than  your  land  of  France, 
Where  grows  the  purple  vine  ;  where  all  delights  grow 
Old  custom  has  made  pleasant. 

Sir  Walter. — You,  that  are  read 
So  deeply  in  our  story,  what  are  you  1 

Margaret. — A  bare  adventurer  ;  in  brief,  a  woman, 
That  put  strange  garments  on,  and  came  thus  far 
To  seek  an  ancient  friend  : 
And  having  spent  her  stock  of  idle  words, 


A  THAGEDY.  377 

And  feeling  some  tears  coming, 

Hastes  now  to  clasp  Sir  Walter  Woodvil's  knee*., 

And  beg  a  boon  for  Margaret,  his  poor  ward.  [kneeling.) 

Sir  Walter. — Not  at  my  feet,  Margaret,  not  at  my  feet. 

Margaret. — Yes,  till  her  suit  is  answered. 

Sir  Walter. — Name  it. 

Margaret.  —  A  little  boon,  and  yet  so  great  a  grace 
She  fears  to  ask  it. 

Sir  Vv  alter. — Some  riddle,  Margaret  ? 

Margaret. — No  riddle,  but  a  plain  request. 

Sir  Walter. — Name  it. 

Margaret. — Free  liberty  of  Sherwood, 
And  leave  to  take  her  lot  with  you  in  the  forest. 

Sir  Walter. — A  scant  petition,  Margaret,  but  take  i- 
Seal'd  with  an  old  man's  tears. 
Rise,  daughter  of  Sir  Rowland.  [Addresses  them  both.) 

Oh  you  most  woriliy, 
You  constant  followers  of  a  man  proscribed, 
Following  poor  misery  in  the  throat  of  danger; 
Fast  servitors  to  crazed  and  penniless  poverty. 
Serving  poor  poverty  without  hope  of  gain  ; 
Kind  children  of  a  sire  unfortunate  ; 
Green  clinging  tendrils  round  a  trunk  decay'd, 
Which  needs  must  bring  on  you  timeless  decay  ; 
Fair  livinn-  forms  to  a  dead  carcass  join'd ; 
What  shall  I  say  ? 

Better  the  dead  were  gather'd  to  the  dead, 
Than  death  and  life  in  disproportion  meet. 
Go,  seek  your  fortunes,  children. 

Simon. — Why.  whither  should  we  go? 

Sir  Walter. —  Yon  to  the  court,  where  now  your  brother  John 
Commits  a  rape  on  Fortune. 

Simon. — Luck  to  John  ! 
A  li'j^ht  heel'd  strumpet,  when  the  sport  is  done. 

Sir  Walter. —  You  to  the  sweet  society  of  your  equals, 
Where  the  world's  fashion  smiles  on  youth  and  beauty. 

Margaret. — Where    young   men's    flatteries    cozen    young 
maids'  beauty. 
There  pride  oft  gets  the  vantage  hand  of  duty — 
There  sweet  humility  withers. 

Simon. — Mistrc  ss  .Maruaret, 
How  fared  mv  hrolher  .lohn  when  you  left  Devon? 

Margaret. — John  was  well,  sir. 

Simon. — ''J'is  now  nine  months  ahnosL 
Since  I  saw  home.     What  new  friends  has  John  made  ? 
Or  keeps  he  his  first  love?     I  did  suspect 
32* 


378  A   TRAGEDY. 

Some  foul  disloyalty.     Now  do  I  know, 

John  has  proved  false  to  her,  for  Margaret  weeps. 

It  is  a  scurvy  brother. 

Sir  Walter. — Fy  upon  it. 
All  men  are  false,  I  think.     The  date  of  love 
Is  out,  expired,  its  stories  all  grown  stale, 
O'erpast,  forgotten,  like  an  antique  tale 
Of  Hero  and  Leander. 

Simon. — I  have  known  some  men  that  are  too  general-con- 
templative for  the  narrow  passion.  I  am  in  some  sort  a  gen- 
eral lover. 

Margaret. — In  the  name  of  the  boy  god,  who  plays  at 
hoodman-bliud  with  the  muses,  and  cares  not  whom  he 
catches,  what  is  it  you  love  1 

Simon. — Simply,  all  things  that  live. 
From  the  crook'd  worm  to  man's  imperial  form, 
And  God-resembling  likeness.     The  poor  fly, 
'J'hat  makes  short  holyday  in  the  sunbeam. 
And  dies  by  some  child's  hand.      The  feeble  bird 
With  little  wings,  yet  greatly  venturous 
In  the  upper  sky.     The  fish  in  th'  other  element, 
That  knows  no  touch  of  eloquence.     What  else  ? 
Yon  tall  and  elegant  stag, 
Who  paints  a  dancing  shadow  of  his  horns 
In  the  water  where  he  drinks. 

Margaret. — I  myself  love  all  these  things,  yet  so  as  with 
a  difference  :  for  example,  some  animals  better  than  others, 
some  men  rather  than  other  men  ;  the  nightingale  before  the 
cuckoo,  the  swift  and  graceful  palfrey  before  the  slow  and 
asinine  mule.  Your  humour  goes  to  confound  all  qualities. 
What  sports  do  you  use  in  the  forest  ? 

Simon. — Not  many  ;  some  few,  as  thus  : — 
To  see  the  sun  to  bed,  and  to  rise. 
Like  some  hot  amourist,  with  glowing  eyes. 
Bursting  the  lazy  bands  of  sleep  that  bound  him. 
With  all  his  fires  and  travelhng  glories  round  him. 
Sometimes  the  moon  on  soft  night  clouds  to  rest. 
Like  beauty  nestling  in  a  young  man's  breast, 
And  all  the  winking  stars,  her  handmaids,  keep 
Admiring  silence,  while  those  lovers  sleep. 
Sometimes  outstretch'd,  in  very  idleness, 
Naught  doing,  saying  little,  thinking  less. 
To  view  the  leaves,  thin  dancers  upon  air, 
Go  eddying  round  ;  and  small  birds,  how  they  fare, 
When  mother  Autumn  fills  their  beaks  with  corn, 
Filch'd  from  the  careless  Amalthea's  horn ; 


A    TRAGEDY.  379 

And  how  the  woods  berries  and  worms  provide 

Without  their  pains,  when  earth  has  naught  beside 

To  answer  their  small  wants 

To  view  the  graceful  deer  come  tripping  by, 

Then  stop,  and  gaze,  then  turn,  they  know  not  why, 

Like  bashful  younkers  in  society. 

To  mark  the  structure  of  a  plant  or  tree, 

And  all  fair  things  of  earth,  how  fair  they  be. 

Margaret. — [smiling)  And,  afterward,  them  paint  in  simile. 

Sir  Walter. — Mistress  Margaret  will  have  need  of  some 
refreshments.     Please  you,  we  have  some  poor  viands  within. 

Margaret. — Indeed,  1  stand  in  need  of  them. 

Sir  Walter. — Under  the  shade  of  a  thick-spreading  tree, 
Upon  the  grass,  no  better  carpeting, 
We'll  eat  our  noontide  meal ;   and,  dinner  done. 
One  of  us  shall  repair  to  Nottingham, 
To  seek  some  safe  night-lodging  in  the  town, 
AVhere  you  may  sleep,  while  here  with  us  you  dwell. 
By  day  in  the  forest,  expecting  better  times, 
And  gentler  habitations,  noble  Margaret. 

Simon. — Allans,  young  Frenchman — 

Margaret. — Allons,  Sir  Englishman.     The  time  has  been, 
I've  studied  love-lays  in  the  English  tongue, 
And  been  enamour'd  of  rare  poesy  : 
Which  now  I  must  unlearn.     Henceforth, 
Sweet  mother-tongue,  old  English  speech,  adieu ; 
For  Margaret  has  got  new  name  and  language  new.  [Exeunt, 


ACT  THE   THIRD. 

Scene — An  apartment  of  State  in  WooJvil  Hall. 

Cavaliers  drinking. 

John  Woodvil,  TjOvel,  Gkav,  and  four  more, 

John.  —  More  mirth,  I  l)(!s(>ech  you,  gentlemen — 
Mr.  Gray,  you  are  not  nn^rrv. 

Gray. — More  wine,  say  i,  and  !nirth  shall  cnsne  in  course. 
What !  we  have  not  yet  abovt;  thre«^  half  pints  a  man  to  an- 
swer for.  Brevity  is  the  soul  of  drinking,  as  of  wit.  De- 
spatch, I  say.      More  wine.  [Fills.) 

First  Gentleman. — I  entreat  you,  let  there  be  some  order, 


380  A    TRAGEDY. 

some  method,  in  our  drinkings.  I  love  to  lose  my  reason 
with  my  eyes  open,  to  commit  the  deed  of  drunkenness  with 
forethought  and  deliberation.  I  love  to  feel  the  fumes  of  the 
liquid  gathering  here,  like  clouds. 

Second  Gentleman. — And  I  am  for  plunging  into  madness 
at  once.  Damn  order,  and  method,  and  steps,  and  degrees, 
that  he  speaks  of.     Let  confusion  have  her  legitimate  work. 

LoveL — I  marvel  why  the  poets,  who,  of  all  men,  methinks, 
should  possess  the  hottest  livers  and  most  empyreal  fancies, 
should  affect  to  see  such  virtues  in  cold  water. 

Gray. — Virtue  in  cold  water  !  ha — ha — ha  ! 

John. — Because  your  poet-born  hath  an  internal  wine, 
richer  than  lippara  or  Canaries,  yet  uncrushed  from  any  grapes 
of  earth,  unpressed  in  mortal  wine-presses. 

Third  Gentleman. — What  may  be  the  name  of  this  wine  ? 

John. — It  hath  as  many  names  as  qualities.  It  is  denomi- 
nated indifferently,  wit,  conceit,  invention,  inspiration,  but  its 
most  royal  and  comprehensive  name  infancy. 

Third  Gentleman. — And  where  keeps  he  this  sovereign 
liquor  ? 

John. — Its  cellars  are  in  the  brain,  whence  your  true  poet 
deriveth  intoxication  at  will ;  while  his  animal  spirits,  catch- 
ing a  pride  from  the  quality  and  neighbourhood  of  their  noble 
relative,  the  brain,  refuse  to  be  sustained  by  wines  and  fer- 
mentations of  earth. 

Third  Gentleman. — But  is  your  poet-born  always  tipsy  with 
this  liquor  ? 

John. — He  hath  his  stoopings  and  reposes  ;  but  his  proper 
element  is  the  sky,  and  in  the  suburbs  of  the  empyrean. 

Third  Gentleman. — Is  your  w^ine-intellectual  so  exquisite  ? 
henceforth,  I,  a  man  of  plain  conceit,  will,  in  all  humility, 
content  my  mind  with  Canaries. 

Fourth  Gentleman. — I  am  for  a  song  or  a  catch.  When 
will  the  catches  come  on,  the  sweet  wicked  catches  ? 

John. — They  cannot  be  introduced  with  propriety  before 
midnight.  Every  man  must  commit  his  twenty  bumpers  first. 
We  are  not  yet  well  roused.  Frank  Lovel,  the  glass  stands 
with  you. 

Lovel. — Gentlemen,  the  duke.  [Fills.) 

All— The  duke.  (  They  drink.) 

Gray. —  (Jan  any  tell  why  his  grace,  being  a  Papist — 

John. — Pshaw  !  we  will  have  no  questions  of  state  now. 
Is  not  this  his  majesty's  birthday? 

Gray. — What  follows  ] 

John. — That  every  man  should  sing,  and  be  joyful,  and  ask 
no  questions. 


A    TRAGEDY.  381 

Second  Gentleman. — Damn  politics,  they  spoil  drinking. 
Third  Gentleman. — For  certain,  'tis  a  blessed  monarchy. 
Second  Gentleman. — The    cursed    fanatic    days   we    have 
seen !     The    times   have   been  when   swearing  was  out  of 
fashion. 

Third  Gentleman. — And  drinking. 
First  Gentleman. — And  wenching. 

Gray. — 'J'he  cursed  yeas  and  forsooths  which  we  have 
heard  uttered,  when  a  man  could  not  rap  out  an  innocent  oath, 
but  straight  the  air  was  thought  to  be  infected. 

Lorel. — 'Twas  a  pleasant  trick  of  the  saint,  which  tliat 
trim  Puritan  Suear-not-at-aU  Smooth-speech  used,  when  his 
spouse  chid  him  with  an  oath  for  committing  with  his  servant- 
maid,  to  cause  his  house  to  be  fumigated  with  burnt  brandy 
and  ends  of  scripture,  to  disperse  the  devil's  breath,  as  he 
termed  it. 

^/Z.— Ha— ha— ha  ! 

Gray. — But  'twas  pleasanter,  when  the  other  saint  Resist- 
the-deml-and-he-wdl-jlee-from-thee  Pureman  was  overtaken  in 
the  act,  to  plead  an  illusio  visus,  and  maintain  his  sanctity 
upon  a  supposed  power  in  the  adversary  to  counterfeit  the 
shapes  of  things. 
All. — Ha — ha — ha  ! 

John. — Another  round,  and  then  let  every  man  devise  what 
trick  he  can  in  his  fancy  for  the  better  manifesting  our  loyalty 
this  day. 

Gray. — Shall  we  hang  a  Puritan  ? 

John. — No,  that  has  been  done  already  in  Coleman-street. 
Second  Gentleman. — Or  fire  a  conventicle  ? 
John. — That  is  stale  too. 

Third  Gentleman. — Or  burn  the  assembly's  catechism  ? 
Fourth  Gentleman. — Or  drink  the  king's  health,  every  man 
standing  upon  his  head  naked? 

Jahn. — [to  hovel)  We  have  here  some  pleasant  madness. 
Third  Gentleman. — Who  shall  pledge  me  in  a  pint  bumper, 
while  we  drink  to  the  king  upon  our  knees? 
Loiul. — Why  on  our  knees,  eavidier? 

John. — [.smiliiio)  For  more  devotion,  to  he  sure.  {To  a 
servant.)     Sirrah,  fetch  th(^  gilt  goblets. 

( The  goblets  are  lrrous;ht.      'I  hey  drinJc  the  lijii^'.s-  health. 

kneeling.      A  shout  of  general  approhationj'olloiriiig 

the  first  appearance  of  the  goblets.) 

John. — We  have  here  the  unchecked  virtues  of  the  grape. 

How   the  vapours  curl   upward!      It  were   a  life   of  gods  to 

dwell  in  such  an  element :   to  see,  and  hear,  and  talk  brave 

things.     Now  fy  upon  these  casual  potations.     'J'hat  a  man's 


382  A    TRAGEDY. 

most  exalted  reason  should  depend  upon  the  ignoble  fermenting 
of  a  fruit  which  sparrows  pluck  as  well  as  we  ! 

Gray. — [aside  to  Lovel)  Observe  how  he  is  ravished. 

Lovel. — Vanity  and  gay  thoughts  of  wine  do  meet  in  him 
and  engender  madness. 

( While  the  rest  are  engaged  in  a  loild  kind  of  talk,  John 
advances  to  the  front  of  the  stage  and  soliloquizes.^ 

John. — My  spirits  turn  lo  fire,  they  mount  so  fast. 
My  joys  are  turbulent,  my  hopes  show  like  fruition. 
These  high  and  gusty  relishes  of  life,  sure, 
Have  no  allayings  of  mortality  in  them. 
I  am  too  hot  now  and  o'ercapable 
For  the  tedious  processes  and  creeping  wisdom 
Of  human  acts,  and  enterprises  of  a  man. 
I  want  some  seasonings  of  adversity, 
Some  strokes  of  the  old  mortifier  calamity, 
To  take  these  swellings  down  divines  call  vanity. 

First  Gentleman. — Mr.  Woodvil,  Mr.  Woodvil. 

Second  Gentleman. — Where  is  Woodvil? 

Gray. — Let  him  alone.  I  have  seen  him  in  these  lunes 
before.     His  abstractions  must  not  taint  the  good  mirth. 

John. — {continuing  to  soliloquize)  Oh  for  some  friend  now 
To  conceal  nothing  from,  to  have  no  secrets. 
How  fine  and  noble  a  thing  is  confidence, 
How  reasonable  too,  and  almost  godlike  ! 
Fast  cement  of  fast  friends,  band  of  society, 
Old  natural  go-between  in  the  world's  business, 
Where  civil  life  and  order,  wanting  this  cement, 
Would  presently  rush  back 
Into  the  pristine  state  of  singularity, 
And  each  man  stand  alone.  (A  servant  enters.) 

Servant. — Gentlemen,  the  fireworks  are  ready. 

First  Gentleman. — What  be  they  1 

Lovel. — The  work  of  London  artists,  which  our  host  has 
provided  in  honour  of  this  day. 

Second  Gentleman. — 'Sdeath,  who  would  part  with  his  wine 
for  a  rocket  ? 

Lovel. — Why  truly,  gentleman,  as  our  kind  host  has  been  at 
the  pains  to  provide  this  spectacle,  we  can  do  no  less  than  be 
present  at  it.  It  will  not  take  up  much  time.  Every  man 
may  return  fresh  and  thirsting  to  his  liquor. 

Third  Gentleman. — There  is  reason  in  what  he  says. 

Second  Gentleman. — Charge  on  then,  bottle  in  hand. 
There's  husbandry  in  that. 

(  They  go  out,  singing.     Only  Lovel  remains,  who  ob- 
serves Woodvil.) 


A    TRAGEDY.  383 

John. — [still  taVdvg  to   himself)  This  Lovel  here's  of  a 
tough  honesty, 
Would  put  the  rack  to  the  proof.     lie  is  not  of  that  sort 
Which  haunt  my  house,  snorting  the  liquors, 
And  when  their  wisdoms  are  afloat  with  wine, 
Spend  vows  as  fast  as  vapours,  which  go  oflf 
Even  with  the  fumes,  their  fathers.     He  is  one 
Whose  sober  morning  actions 
Shame  not  his  o'ernight  promises  ; 
Talks  little,  flatters  less,  and  makes  no  promises  ; 
Why  this  is  he,  whom  the  dark-wisdom'd  fate 
Might  trust  her  counsels  of  predestination  with. 
And  the  world  be  no  loser. 

Why  should  I  fear  this  man?  (Seeing  Lovel.) 

Where  is  the  company  gone  ? 

Lovel. — To  see  the  fireworks,  where  you  will  be  expected 
to  follow.     But  I  perceive  you  are  better  engaged. 

John. — I  have  been  meditating  this  half  hour 
On  all  the  properties  of  a  brave  friendship. 
The  mysteries  that  are  in  it,  the  noble  uses, 
]ts  limits  withal,  and  its  nice  boundaries. 
Exempli  gratia,  how  far  a  man 
May  lawfully  forswear  himself  for  his  friend ; 
What  quantity  of  lies,  some  of  them  brave  ones, 
He  may  lawfully  incur  in  a  friend's  behalf; 
What  oaths,  blood-crimes,  hereditary  quarrels. 
Night  brawls,  fierce  words,  and  duels  in  the  morning. 
He  need  not  stick   at  to  maintain  his  friend's  honour  or  his 
cause. 
Lovel. — I  think  many  men  would  die  for  their  friend. 
John. — Death !   why  'tis  nothing.     We  go  to  it  for  sport, 
To  gain  a  name,  or  purse,  or  please  a  sullen  humour, 
When  one  has  worn  his  fortune's  livery  threadbare, 
Or  his  spleen'd  mistress  frowns.     Husbands  will  venture  on 

it 
To  cure  the  hot  fits  and  cold  shakings  of  jealousy. 
A  friend,  sir,  must  do  more. 

Lovtl. — Can  he  do  more  than  die  ? 

John. — To  serve  a  friend  this  he  may  do.     Pray  mark  me. 
Having  a  law  within,  (groat  spirits  feel  one,) 
He  cannot,  ought  not  to  be  bound  by  any 
Positive  laws  or  ord'nances  extern. 
But  may  reject  all  these  :   by  tlio  law  of  friendship 
He  may  do  so  much,  be  they,  indiflVrontiy, 
Penn'd  statutes,  or  the  land's  unwritten  usages, 
As  public  fame,  civil  compliances, 


384  A    TRAGEDY. 

Misnamed  honour,  trust  in  matter  of  secrets, 
All  vows  and  promises,  the  feeble  mind's  religion  ; 
(Binding  our  morning  knowledge  to  approve 
What  last  night's  ignorance  spake  ;) 
The  ties  of  blood  withal,  and  prejudice  of  kin. 
Sir,  these  weak  terrors 

Must  never  shake  me.     I  know  what  belongs 
To  a  worthy  friendship.     Come,  you  shall  have  my  confi 
dence. 

Lovel, — I  hope  you  think  me  worthy. 

JoJin. — You  will  smile  to  hear  now — 
Sir  Walter  never  has  been  out  of  the  island. 

Lovel. — You  amaze  me. 

John. — That  same  report  of  his  escape  to  France 
Was  a  fine  tale,  forged  by  myself — 
Ha— ha ! 
I  knew  it  would  stagger  him. 

Lovel. — Pray,  give  me  leave. 
Where  has  he  dwelt,  how  lived,  how  lain  conceal'd? 
Sure,  I  may  ask  so  much. 

John. — From  place  to  place,  dwelling  in  no  place  long. 
My  brother  Simon  still  hath  borne  him  company, 
{'Tis  a  brave  youth,  I  envy  him  all  his  virtues.) 
Disguised  in  foreign  garb,  they  pass  for  Frenchmen, 
Two  Protestant  exiles  from  the  Limosin 
Newly  arrived.     Their  dwelling's  now  at  Nottingham, 
Where  no  soul  knows  them. 

Lovel — Can  you  assign  any  reason  why  a  gentleman  of 
Sir  Walter's  known  prudence  should  expose  his  person  so 
lightly  ? 

John. — I  believe  a  certain  fondness, 
A  child-like  cleaving  to  the  land  that  gave  him  birth. 
Chains  him  like  fate. 

Lovel. — I  have  known  some  exiles  thus 
To  linger  out  the  term  of  the  law's  indulgence. 
To  the  hazard  of  being  known. 

John. — You  may  suppose  sometimes 
They  use  the  neighb'ring  Sherwood  for  their  sport, 
Their  exercise  and  freer  recreation. 
I  see  you  smile.     Pray  now,  be  careful. 

Lovel. — I  am  no  babbler,  sir  ;  you  need  not  fear  me. 

John. — But  some  men  have  been  known  to  talk  in  their 
sleep, 
And  tell  fine  tales  that  way. 

Lovel. — I  have  heard  so  much.     But,  to  say  truth,  I  mostly 
sleep  alone. 


A    TRAGEDY.  385 

John. — Or  drink,  sir?  do  you  never  drink  too  freely? 
Some  men  will  drink,  and  tell  you  all  their  secrets. 

Lovel. — Why  do  you  question  me,  who  know  my  habits  ? 
John. — 1  think  you  are  no  sot. 
No  tavern-troubler,  worshipper  of  the  grape  ; 
But  all  men  drink  sometimes, 
And  veriest  saints  at  festivals  relax, 
The  marriage  of  a  friend,  or  a  wife's  birth(hiv. 

Lovel. — How  much,  sir,  may  a  man  with  safety  drink  ? 

{Smiling.) 
John. — Sir,  three  half  pints  a  day  is  reasonable  ; 
I  care  not  if  you  never  exceed  that  quantity. 

Lovel. — I  shall  observe  it ; 
On  holydays  two  quarts. 

John. — Or  stay  ;  you  keep  no  wench? 
Lovel. — Ha ! 

John. — No  painted  mistress  for  your  private  hours  ? 
You  keep  no  whore,  sir  ? 

Lovel. — What  does  he  mean  ? 
John. — Who,  for  a  close  embrace,  a  toy  of  sin. 
And  amorous  praising  of  your  worship's  breath, 
In  rosy  junction  of  four  melting  lips, 

Can  kiss  out  secrets  from  you  ?  [you  ! 

Lovel. — How  strange  this  passionate   behaviour  shows  in 
Sure,  you  think  me  some  weak  one. 

John. — Pray,  pardon  me  some  fears. 
You  have  now  the  pledge  of  a  dear  father's  life. 
I  am  a  son — would  fain  be  thought  a  lovinsr  one  : 
You  may  allow  me  some  fears  :  do  not  despise  me 
If,  in  a  posture  foreign  to  my  spirit, 
And  by  our  well-knit  friendship,  I  conjure  you, 
Touch  not  Sir  Walter's  life.  (Kneels.) 

You  see  these  tears.     My  father's  an  old  man. 
Pray  let  him  live. 

Lovel. — I  must  be  bold  to  tell  you,  these  new  freedoms 
Show  most  unhandsome  in  you. 

.Tohn. — (rising)  Ha  !   do  you  say  so  ? 
Sure,  you  are  not  grown  proud  upon  my  secret  ? 
Ah  !  now  I  see  it  plain.     He  would  be  babbling. 
No  doubt  a  garrulous  and  hard-faced  traitor — 
But  I'll  not  give;  you  leav(!.  (Draws.) 

Lovel. — What  does  this  madman  mean  ? 
John. — ( -'ome,  sir  ;  here  is  no  subterfuge. 
You  must  kill  me,  or  I  kill  you. 

Lovel. — (drawing)  Then  self-defence  plead  my  excuse. 
Have  at  you,  sir.  (They  fight.) 

Vol.  l.—Xi  K 


386  A    TRAGEDY. 

John. — Stay,  sir. 
I  hope  you  have  made  your  will. 
If  not,  'tis  no  great  matter. 
A  broken  cavalier  has  seldom  much 
He  can  bequeath  :   an  old  worn  peruke, 
A  snuff-box  with  a  picture  of  Prince  Rupert, 
A  rusty  sword  he'll  swear  was  used  at  Naseby, 
Though  it  ne'er  came  within  ten  miles  of  the  place, 
And,  if  he's  very  rich, 
A  cheap  edition  of  the  Icon  Basilike, 
Is  mostly  all  the  wealth  he  dies  possess'd  of. 
You  say  few  prayers,  I  fancy  ; 
So  to  it  again.  {^They fight  again.     Level  is  disarmed.) 

Level. — You  had  best  now  take  my  life.  I  guess  you  mean  it. 

Jehu. — {musing)  No  :  men  will  say  I  fear'd  him  if  1  kill'd 
him. 
Live  still,  and  be  a  traitor  in  thy  wish, 
But  never  act  thy  thought,  being  a  coward. 
That  vengeance,  which  thy  soul  shall  nightly  thirst  for, 
And  this  disgrace  I've  done  you  cry  aloud  for, 
Still  have  the  will  without  the  power  to  execute. 
So  now  I  leave  you, 
Feeling  a  sweet  security.     No  doubt 
My  secret  shall  remain  a  virgin  for  you ! 

[Gees  out,  smiling  in  scorn.) 

Level. — (rising)  For  once  you  are  mistaken  in  your  man. 
The  deed  you  wot  of  shall  forthwith  be  done. 
A  bird  let  loose,  a  secret  out  of  hand, 
Returns  not  back.     Why,  then,  'tis  baby  policy 
To  menace  him  who  hath  it  in  his  keeping. 
I  will  go  look  for  Gray  ; 

Then,  northward  ho  !  such  tricks  as  we  shall  play 
Have  not  been  seen,  I  think,  in  merry  Sherwood 
Since  the  days  of  Robin  Hood,  that  archer  good. 


ACT  THE  FOURTH. 

Scene — An  apartment  in  Woedvil  Hall. 

John  Woedvil. — [alone)  A  weight  of   wine  lies  heavy  on 
my  head, 
The  unconcocted  follies  of  last  night. 


A    TRAGEDV.  387 

Now  all  those  jovial  fancies  and  briglu  hopes, 

Children  of  wine,  go  off  like  dreams. 

This  sick  vertigo  here 

Preacheth  of  temperance,  no  sermon  better. 

These  black  thoughts  and  dull  melancholy, 

That  stick  like  burs  to  the  brain,  will  they  ne'er  leave  me  ? 

Some  men  are  full  of  choler  when  they  are  drunk  ; 

Some  brawl  of  matter  foreign  to  themselves  ; 

And  some,  the  most  resolved  fools  of  all, 

Have  told  their  dearest  secrets  in  their  cups. 

Scene — The  Forest. 

SIR  WALTER. SIMON. LOVEL. GRAY. 

Lovel. — Sir,  we  are  sorry  we  cannot  return  your  French 
salutation. 

Gray. — Nor  otherwise  consider  this  garb  you  trust  to  than 
as  a  poor  disguise.  •  * 

Lovel. — Nor  use  much  ceremony  with  a  traitor. 

Gray. — Therefore,  without  much  induction  of  superfluous 
v/ords,  I  attach  you.  Sir  Walter  Woodvil,  of  high  treason,  in 
the  king's  name. 

Lovel. — And  of  taking  part  in  the  great  rebellion  against 
our  late  lawful  sovereign,  Charles  the  First. 

Simon. — John  has  betrayed  us,  father. 

Lovel. — Come,  sir,  you  had  best  surrender  fairly.  We  know 
you,  sir. 

(S7mon.  — Hang  ye,  villains,  ye  are  two  better  known  than 
trusted.  I  have  seen  those  faces  before.  Are  ye  not  two 
beggarly  retainers,  trencher-parasites  to  John?  I  think  ye 
rank  above  his  footmen.  A  sort  of  bed  and  board  worms — 
locusts  that  infest  our  house  ;  a  leprosy  that  long  has  hung 
upon  its  walls  and  princely  apartments,  reaching  to  fill  all  the 
corners  of  my  brother's  once  noble  heart. 

Gray. — We  are  his  friends. 

Simon. — Fy,  sir,  do  not  weep.  How  tliese  rogues  will  tri- 
umph !      Shall  I  whip  olVth(;ir  heads,  father?  {Drairs.) 

Lovel.  —  Come,  sir,  though  this  show  handsome  in  you,  being 
liis  son,  yet  the  law  must  have  its  course. 

Simon.  —  And  if  I  tell  you  the  law  shall  not  have  its  course, 
cannot  ye  be  content?  Courage,  father;  shall  sucli  things  as 
these  apprehend  a  man  ?  Which  of  yt!  will  venlurcMipon  me? 
Will  you,  Mr.  ('Onstahle  self-elect?  or  you,  sir,  with  a  pimple 
on  your  nose,  got  at  Oxford  by  hard  drinking,  your  only  badge 
of  loyalitv  ?  „ 


388  A    TRAGEDY. 

Gray. — 'Tis  a  brave  youth — I  cannot  strike  at  him. 

Simon. — Father,  why  do  you  cover  your  face  with  your 
hands  ?  Why  do  you  fetch  your  breath  so  hard  ?  See,  vil- 
lains, his  heart  is  burst!  Oh,  villains,  he  cannot  speak.  One 
of  you  run  for  some  water :  quickly,  ye  knaves  ;  will  ye  have 
your  throats  cut?  {They  both  slink  off.) 

How  is  it  with  you,  Sir  Walter?    Look  up,  sir  ;  the  villains 
are  gone.    He  hears  me  not,  and  this  deep  disgrace  of  treach- 
ery in  his  son  hath  touched  him  even  to  the  death.     Oh,  most 
distuned  and  distempered  world,  where  sons  talk  their  aged 
fathers  into  their  graves  !     Garrulous  and  diseased  world,  and 
still  empty,  rotten,  and  hollow  talking  world,  where  good  men 
decay,  states  turn  round  in  an  endless  mutability,  and  still  for 
the  worse,  nothing  is  at  a  stay,  nothing  abides  but  vanity, 
chaotic  vanity.     Brother,  adieu  ! 
There  lies  the  parent  stock  which  gave  us  life, 
Which  I  will  see  consign'd  with  tears  to  earth. 
Leave  thou  the  solemn  funeral  rites  to  me. 
Grief  and  a  true  remorse  abide  with  thee. 

{Bears  in  the  body.) 


Scene — Another  part  of  the  Forest. 

Margaret. — (alone)  It  was  an  error  merely,  and  no  crime- 
An  unsuspecting  openness  in  youth. 
That  from  his  lips  the  fatal  secret  drew. 
Which  should  have  slept  like  one  of  nature's  mysteries, 
Unveil'd  by  any  man. 
Well,  he  is  dead  ! 

And  what  should  Margaret  do  in  the  forest  ? 
Oh,  ill-starr'd  John  ! 
Oh,  Woodvil,  man  enfeoffed  to  despair ! 
Take  thy  farewell  of  peace. 
Oh  never  look  again  to  see  good  days, 
Or  close  thy  lids  in  comfortable  nights, 
Or  ever  think  a  happy  thought  again, 
If  what  I  have  heard  be  true — 
Forsaken  of  the  world  must  Woodvil  live, 
If  he  did  tell  these  men. 

No  tongue  must  speak  to  him,  no  tongue  of  man 
Salute  him  when  he  wakes  up  in  a  morning; 
Or  bid  "  good-night"  to  John.     Who  seeks  to  live 
In  amity  with  thee,  must  for  thy  sake 
Abide  the  world's  reproach.     What  then  ? 
Shall  Margaret  join  the  clamours  of  the  world 


A    TRAGEDY 


389 


Against  her  friend?     Oh,  undiscerning  world, 
That  cannot  from  misfortune  separate  guilt, 
No,  not  in  thought !  Oh,  never,  never,  John. 
Prepared  to  share  the  fortunes  of  her  friend 
For  better  or  for  worse  thy  Margaret  comes, 
To  pour  into  thy  wounds  a  healing  love, 
And  wake  the  memory  of  an  ancient  friendship. 
And  pardon  me,  tiiou  spirit  of  Sir  Walter, 
Who  in  compassion  to  the  wretched  living, 
Have  but  few  tears  to  waste  upon  the  dead. 


Scene — Woodvil  Hall. 

Sandford.  Margaret. 

{^ As  from  a  Journey.) 

Sandford. — The  violence  of  the  sudden  mischance  hath  so 
wrought  in  him,  who  by  nature  is  allied  to  nothing  less  than  a 
self-debasing  humour  of  dejection,  that  I  have  never  seen  any- 
thing more  changed  and  spirit-broken.  He  hath,  with  a  per- 
emptory resolution,  dismissed  the  partners  of  his  riots  and 
late  hours,  denied  his  house  and  person  to  their  most  earnest 
solicitings,  and  will  be  seen  by  none.  He  keeps  ever  alone, 
and  his  grief  (which  is  solitary)  does  not  so  much  seem  to 
possess  and  govern  in  him,  as  it  is  by  him,  with  a  wilfulness 
of  most  manifest  affection,  entertained  and  cherished. 

Margaret. — How  bears  he  up  against  the  common  rumour  ? 

Sandford. — Wiih  a  strange  indifference,  which  whosoever 
dives  not  into  the  niceness  of  his  sorrow  might  mistake  for 
obdurate  and  insensate.  Yet  are  the  wings  of  his  pride  for 
ever  clipped ;  and  yet  a  virtuous  predominance  of  filial  grief 
is  so  ever  uppermost,  that  you  may  discover  his  thoughts  less 
troubled  with  conjecturing  what  living  opinions  will  say,  and 
judge  of  his  deeds,  than  absorbed  and  buried  with  the  dead, 
whom  his  indiscretion  made  so. 

Margaret. — I  knew  a  greatness  ever  to  be  resident  in  him, 
to  which  the  admiring  eyes  of  men  should  look  up  even  in 
the  declining  and  bankrnj)t  stiite  of  his  pride.  Fain  would  I 
see  him,  fain  talk  with  him  ;  but  that  a  sense  of  nvspect, 
which  is  violated,  when  without  deliberation  we  press  into 
the  society  of  tlie  unhappy,  cheeks  and  holds  me  back.  How 
think  you  he  would  bear  my  presence  I 

Sandford. — As  of  an  assured  friend,  whom  in  the  forgetful- 
ness  of  his  fortunes  he  passed  by.  See  him  you  must ;  but 
33* 


390  A    TRAGEDY. 

not  to-night.  The  newness  of  the  sight  shall  move  the  bit- 
terest compunction  and  the  truest  remorse ;  but  afterward, 
trust  me,  dear  lady,  the  happiest  effects  of  a  returning  peace, 
and  a  gracious  comfort  to  him,  to  you,  and  all  of  us. 

Margaret. — I  think  he  would  not  deny  me.  He  hath  ere 
this  received  farewell  letters  from  his  brother,  who  hath  taken 
a  resolution  to  estrange  himself,  for  a  time,  from  country, 
friends,  and  kindred,  and  to  seek  occupation  for  his  sad 
thoughts  in  travelling  in  foreign  places,  where  sights  remote 
and  extern  to  himself  may  draw  from  him  kindly  and  not 
painful  ruminations. 

Sandford. — I  vvas  present  at  the  receipt  of  the  letter.  The 
contents  seemed  to  affect  him,  for  a  moment,  with  a  more 
lively  passion  of  grief  than  he  has  at  any  time  outwardly 
shown.  He  wept  with  many  tears,  (which  I  had  not  before 
noted  in  him,)  and  appeared  to  be  touched  with  a  sense  as  of 
some  unkindness ;  but  the  cause  of  their  sad  separation  and 
divorce  quickly  recurring,  he  presently  returned  to  his  former 
inwardness  of  suffering. 

Margaret. — The  reproach  of  his  brother's  presence  at  this 
hour  would  have  been  a  weight  more  than  could  be  sustained 
by  his  already  oppressed  and  sinking  spirit.  Meditating  upon 
these  intricate  and  wide-spread  sorrows  hath  brought  a  heav- 
iness upon  me,  as  of  sleep.     How  goes  the  night  ? 

Sandford. — An  hour  past  sunset.  You  shall  first  refresh 
your  limbs  (tired  with  travel)  with  meats  and  some  cordial 
wine,  and  then  betake  your  no  less  wearied  mind  to  repose. 

Margaret. — A  good  rest  to  us  all. 

Sandford. — Thanks,  lady. 


ACT  THE  FIFTH. 

John  Woodvil  (^dressing.) 

John. — How  beautiful  [handling  his  mourning. ) 

And  comely  do  these  mourning  garments  show  ! 
Sure,  grief  hath  set  his  sacred  impress  here, 
To  claim  the  world's  respect !  they  note  so  feelingly 
By  outward  types  the  serious  man  within. 
Alas  !   what  part  or  portion  can  I  claim 
In  all  the  decencies  of  virtuous  sorrow 
Which  other  mourners  use  ?  as,  namely, 


A    TRAGEDY.  391 

This  black  attire,  abstraction  from  society, 

Good  thoughts,  and  frequent  sighs,  and  seldom  smiles, 

A  cleaving  sadness  native  to  the  brow, 

All  sweet  condolements  of  like-grieved  friends, 

(That  steal  away  the  sense  of  loss  almost,) 

Men's  pity,  and  good  offices 

Which  enemies  themselves  do  for  us  then. 

Putting  their  hostile  disposition  off 

As  we  put  off  our  high  thoughts  and  proud  looks. 

(^Pauses ^  and  observes  the  pictures.) 
Thebc  pictures  must  be  taken  down  : 
The  portraitures  of  our  most  ancient  family 
For  nigh  three  hundred  years  !     How  have  I  listen'd 
To  hear  Sir  Walter,  with  an  old  man's  pride, 
Holding  me  in  his  arms,  a  prating  boy. 
And  pointing  to  the  pictures  where  they  hung, 
Repeat  by  course  their  worthy  histories  ; 
(As  Hugh  de  Widville,  Walter,  first  of  the  name, 
And  Anne  the  handsome,  Stephen,  and  famous  John : 
'J'elliiig  me  I  must  be  his  famous  John.) 
But  tiiat  was  in  old  times. 
Now,  no  more 

Must  I  grow  proud  upon  our  house's  pride. 
I  ratlier,  J,  by  most  unheard-of  crimes, 
Have  backward  tainted  all  their  noble  blood, 
Rased  out  the  memory  of  an  ancient  family, 
And  quite  reversed  the  honours  of  our  house. 
Who  now  shall  sit  and  tell  us  anecdotes? 
The  secret  history  of  his  own  times, 
And  fashions  of  the  world  when  he  was  young : 
How  England  slept  out  three-and-twenty  years. 
While  Carr  and  Villicrs  ruled  the  baby  king : 
The  costly  fancies  of  the  pedant's  reign. 
Balls,  feaslings,  huntings,  shows  in  allegory, 
And  beauties  of  the  court  of  James  the  First. 

Margaret  enters. 

John. — Comes  Margaret  here  to  witness  my  disgrace  ■? 
Oh,  lady,  I  have  sulfcrM  loss 
And  diminution  of  my  honour's  brightness. 
You  bring  some  images  of  old  times,  Margaret, 
That  should  bo,  now  forgotten. 

Margaret. — Old  linu-fs  .should  never  be  forgotten,  John. 
I  came  to  talk  about  them  with  my  friend. 

John.— I  did  refuse  you,  Margaret,  in  my  pride. 


392  A    TRAGEDY. 

Margaret. — If  John  rejected  Margaret  in  his  pride, 
(As  who  does  not,  being  splenetic,  refuse 
Sometimes  old  playfellows,)  the  spleen  being  gone, 
The  offence  no  longer  lives. 
Oh,  Woodvil,  those  were  happy  days, 
When  we  two  first  began  to  love.     When  first. 
Under  pretence  of  visiting  my  father, 
(Being  then  a  stripling  nigh  upon  my  age,) 
You  came  a  wooing  to  his  daughter,  John. 
Do  you  remember 

With  what  a  coy  reserve  and  seldom  speech 
(Young  maidens  must  be  chary  of  their  speech) 
I  kept  the  honours  of  my  maiden  pride  1 
I  was  your  favourite  then. 

John. — Oh,  Margaret,  Margaret ! 
These  your  submissions  to  my  low  estate, 
And  cleavings  to  the  fates  of  sunken  Woodvil, 
Write  bitter  things  'gainst  my  unworthiness. 
Thou  perfect  pattern  of  thy  slander'd  sex, 
Whom  miseries  of  mine  could  never  alienate, 
Nor  change  of  fortune  shake  ;  whom  injuries, 
And  slights  (the  worst  of  injuries)  which  moved 
Thy  nature  to  return  scorn  with  like  scorn. 
Then  when  you  left  in  virtuous  pride  this  house, 
Could  not  so  separate,  but  now  in  this 
My  day  of  shame,  when  all  the  world  forsake  me. 
You  only  visit  me,  love,  and  forgive  me. 

Margaret. — Dost  yet  remember  the  green  arbour,  John, 
In  the  south  gardens  of  my  father's  house, 
Where  we  have  seen  the  summer  sun  go  down, 
Exchanging  true  love's  vows  without  restraint? 
And  that  old  wood,  you  call'd  your  wilderness, 
And  vow'd  in  sport  to  build  a  chapel  in  it, 
There  dwell 

*'  Like  hermit  poor 
In  pensive  place  obscure," 

And  tell  your  Ave  Maries  by  the  curls 

(Dropping  like  golden  beads)  of  Margaret's  hair ; 

And  make  confession  seven  times  a  day 

Of  every  thought  that  stray'd  from  love  and  Margaret ; 

And  I,  your  saint,  the  penance  should  appoint — 

Believe  me,  sir,  I  will  not  now  be  laid 

Aside,  like  an  old  fashion. 

John. — Oh,  lady,  poor  and  abject  are  my  thoughts, 
My  nride  is  cured,  my  hopes  are  under  clouds, 


A    TRAGEDY.  393 

I  have  no  part  in  any  good  man's  love, 

In  all  earth's  pleasures  portion  have  I  none, 

I  fade  and  wither  in  my  own  esteem, 

This  earth  holds  not  alive  so  poor  a  thing  as  I  am. 

I  was  not  always  thus.  (Weeps.) 

Margaret. — Thou  noble  nature, 
Which,  lion-like,  didst  awe  the  inferior  creature, 
Now  trampled  on  by  beasts  of  basest  quality. 
My  dear  heart's  lord,  life's  pride,  soul-honour'd  John ! 
Upon  her  knees  (regard  her  poor  request) 
Your  favourite,  once-beloved  Margaret,  kneels. 

John. — What  wouldst  thou,  lady,  ever-honour'd  Margaret  ? 

Margaret. — That  John  would  think  more  nobly  of  himself, 
More  worthily  of  high  Heaven  ; 
And  not  for  one  misfortune,  child  of  chance, 
No  crime,  but  unforeseen,  and  sent  to  punish 
The  less  offence  with  image  of  the  greater. 
Thereby  to  work  the  soul's  humility, 
(Which  end  hath  happily  not  been  frustrate  quite,) 
Oh,  not  for  one  offence  mistrust  Heaven's  mercy. 
Nor  quit  thy  hope  of  happy  days  to  come — 
John  yet  has  many  happy  days  to  live  ; 
To  live  and  make  atonement. 

John. — Excellent  lady. 
Whose  suit  hath  drawn  this  softness  from  my  eyes 
Not  the  world's  scorn  nor  falling  off  of  friends 
Could  ever  do.     Will  you  go  with  me,  Margaret  ? 

Margaret. — (rising)  Go  whither,  John  ? 

John. — Go  in  with  me. 
And  pray  for  the  peace  of  our  unquiet  minds  ? 

Margaret. — That  1  will,  John.  [Exeunt 

Scene — An  inner  Apartment. 

John  is  discovered  kneeling. — Margaret  standing  over  him. 

John. — (rises)  I  cannot  bear 
To  see  you  waste  that  youth  and  excellent  beauty, 
('Tis  now  the  golden  time  of  the  day  with  you,) 
In  tending  such  a  broken  wretch  as  I  am. 

Margaret. — John  will  break  Margaret's  heart,  if  he  speak  so. 
Oh,  sir,  sir,  sir,  you  arc  too  melancholy, 
And  I  must  call  it  caprice.     I  am  somewhat  hold 
Perhaps  in  this.     But  you  are  now  my  patient, 
(You  know  you  gave  nic  leave  to  call  you  so,) 
And  I  must  chide  these  pestilent  humours  from  you. 

R'3 


394  A  TRAGEDY. 

John. — They  are  gone. 
Mark,  love,  how  cheerfully  I  speak ! 
I  can  smile  loo,  and  I  almost  begin 
To  understand  what  kind  of  creature  Hope  is. 

Margaret. — Now  this   is   better,  this  mirth  becomes   you, 
John. 

John. — Yet  tell  me  if  I  over-act  my  mirth  ; 
(Being  but  a  novice,  I  may  fall  into  that  error  ;) 
That  were  a  sad  indecency,  you  know. 

Margaret. — Nay,  never  fear. 
I  will  be  mistress  of  your  humours, 
And  you  shall  frown  or  smile  by  the  book. 
And  herein  I  shall  be  most  peremptory, 
Cry,  "  this  shows  well,  but  that  inclines  to  levity  ;" 
"  This  frown  has  too  much  of  the  Woodvil  in  it," 
*'  But  that  fine  sunshine  has  redeem'd  it  quite." 

John. — How  sweetly  Margaret  robs  me  of  myself ! 

Margaret. — To  give  you  in  your  stead  a  better  self! 
Such  as  you  were  when  these  eyes  first  beheld 
You  mounted  on  your  sprightly  steed,  White  Margery, 
Sir  Rowland,  my  father's  gift. 
And  all  my  maidens  gave  my  heart  for  lost. 
I  was  a  young  thing  then,  being  newly  come 
Home  from  my  convent  education,  where 
Seven  years  I  had  wasted  in  the  bosom  of  France ; 
Returning  home  true  Protestant,  you  call'd  me 
Your  little  heretic  nun.     How  timid-bashful 
Did  John  salute  his  love,  being  newly  seen. 
Sir  Rowland  term'd  it  a  rare  modesty, 
And  praised  it  in  a  youth. 

John. — Now  Margaret  weeps  herself. 

(-4.  noise  of  bells  heard.) 

Margaret. — Hark  the  bells,  John. 

John. — Those  are  the  church  bells  of  St.  Mary  Ottery. 

Margaret. — I  know  it. 

John. — Saint  Mary  Ottery,  my  native  village. 
In  the  sweet  shire  of  Devon. 
Those  are  the  bells. 

Margaret. — Wilt  go  to  church,  John  ? 

John. — I  have  been  there  already. 

Margaret. — How  canst  say  thou  hast  been  there  already  ? 
The  bells  are  only  now  ringing  for  morning  service,  and 
hast  thou  been  at  church  already  ? 

John. — I  left  my  bed  betimes,  I  could  not  sleep  ; 
And  when  I  rose,  I  look'd  (as  my  custom  is) 
From  my  chamber  window,  where  I  can  see  the  sun  rise , 


A    TRAGEDY.  395 

A.nd  the  first  object  I  discern'd 

Was  the  glistering  spire  of  St.  Mary  Ottery. 

Margaret. — Well,  John. 

John. — Then  I  remember'd  'twas  the  Sabbath-day. 
Immediately  a  wish  arose  in  my  mind 
To  go  to  church  and  pray  with  Christian  people. 
And  then  I  check'd  myself,  and  said  to  myself, 
"  'J'hou  hast  been  a  heathen,  John,  these  two  years  past ; 
(Not  having  been  at  church  in  all  that  time;) 
And  is  it  fit,  that  now  for  the  first  time 
Thou  shouldst  offend  the  eyes  of  Christian  people 
With  a  murderer's  presence  in  the  house  of  prayer  ? 
Thou  wouldst  but  discompose  their  pious  tlioughts, 
And  do  thyself  no  good  :   for  how  couldst  thou  pray, 
With  unwash'd  hands,  and  lips  unused  to  the  offices?" 
And  then  I  at  my  own  presumption  smiled ; 
And  then  I  wept  that  I  should  smile  at  all, 
Having  such  cause  of  grief !   I  wept  outright ; 
Tears  like  a  river  flooded  all  my  face. 
And  I  began  to  pray,  and  found  I  could  pray  ; 
And  still  I  yearn'd  to  say  my  prayers  in  the  church. 
"  Doubtless,"  said  1,  "  one  might  find  comfort  in  it." 
So  stealing  down  the  stairs,  like  one  that  fear'd  detection, 
Or  was  about  to  act  unlawful  business 
At  that  dead  time  of  dawn, 

I  flew  to  the  church,  and  found  the  doors  wide  open  : 
(Whether  by  negligence  I  knew  not, 
Or  some  peculiar  grace  to  me  vouchsafed. 
For  all  things  felt  like  mystery.) 

Margaret. — Yes. 

John. — So  entering  in,  not  without  fear, 
I  pass'd  into  the  family  pew. 
And  covering  up  my  eyes  for  shame 
And  deep  perception  of  unworthiness, 
Upon  the  little  hassock  knelt  me  down, 
Where  I  so  oft  had  kneel'd, 
A  docile  infant,  by  Sir  Walter's  side  ; 
And,  thinking  so,  I  wept  a  second  flood 
More  poignant  than  the  first; 
But  afterward  was  greatly  comforted. 
It  seem'd  the  guilt  of  blood  was  passing  from  me 
Even  in  the  act  and  agony  of  tears, 
And  all  niy  sins  forgiven. 


THE     WITCH: 

A    DRAxMATIC    SKETCH    OF   THE    SEVENTEENTH 

CENTURY. 


CHARACTERS. 


Old  Servant  in  the  Family  of  Sir  Francis  Fairford. 

Stranger. 

Servant. — One  summer  night,  Sir  Francis,  as  it  chanced, 
Was  pacing  to  and  fro  in  the  avenue 
That  westward  fronts  our  house, 
Among  those  aged  oaks,  said  to  have  been  planted 
Three  hundred  years  ago 
By  a  neighb'ring  prior  of  the  Fairford  name. 
Being  o'ertask'd  in  thought,  he  heeded  not 
The  importunate  suit  of  one  who  stood  by  the  gate, 
And  begged  an  ahns. 

Some  say  he  shoved  her  rudely  from  the  gate 
With  angry  chiding ;  but  I  can  never  think 
(Our  master's  nature  hath  a  sweetness  in  it) 
That  he  could  use  a  woman,  an  old  woman, 
With  such  discourtesy  :  but  he  refused  her — 
And  better  had  he  met  a  lion  in  his  path 
Than  that  old  woman  that  night ; 
For  she  was  one  who  practised  the  black  arts, 
And  served  the  devil,  being  since  burned  for  witchcraft. 
She  looked  at  him  as  one  that  meant  to  blast  him : 
And  with  a  frightful  noise, 
{'Twas  partly  like  a  woman's  voice, 
And  partly  like  the  hissing  of  a  snake,) 
She  nothing  said  but  this  : 
(Sir  Francis  told  the  words.) 

"  A  mischief,  mischief  mischief 
And  a  ninC'times-Jcillrng  curse, 
34 


.398  THE    WITCH. 

By  day  and  by  night,  to  the  caitiff  wight. 
Who  shakes  the  poor  like  snakes  from  his  door. 
And  shuts  up  the  womb  of  his  purse.^^ 

And  still  she  cried, 

"  A  mischief 
And  a  ninefold-withering  curse : 
For  that  shall  come  to  thee  that  will  undo  thee. 
Both  all  that  thoufearest  and  worse." 

So  saying,  she  departed, 
Leaving  Sir  Francis  like  a  man  beneath 
Whose  feet  a  scaffolding  was  suddenly  falling ; 
So  he  described  it. 

Stranger. — A  terrible  curse  !     What  followed  ? 

Servant. — Nothing  immediate  ;  but  some  two  months  after 
Young  Philip  Fairford  suddenly  fell  sick, 
A.nd  none  could  tell  what  ailed  him ;  for  he  lay, 
And  pined,  and  pined,  till  all  his  hair  fell  off. 
And  he,  that  was  full-fleshed,  became  as  thin 
As  a  two-months'  babe  that  has  been  starved  in  the  nursmg. 
And  sure,  I  think 

He  bore  his  death-wound  like  a  little  child ; 
With  such  rare  sweetness  of  dumb  melancholy, 
He  strove  to  clothe  his  agony  in  smiles. 
Which  he  would  force  up  in  his  poor  pale  cheeks. 
Like  ill-timed  guests  that  had  no  proper  dwelling  there  ; 
And  when  they  asked  him  his  complaint,  he  laid 
His  hand  upon  his  heart,  to  show  the  place 
Where  Susan  came  to  him  a-nights,  he  said, 
And  prick'd  him  with  a  pin — 
And  thereupon  Sir  Francis  called  to  mind 
The  beggar-witch  that  stood  by  the  gateway 
And  begged  an  alms. 

Stranger. — But  did  the  witch  confess  ? 

Servant. — All  this  and  more  at  her  death. 

Stranger. — I  do  not  love  to  credit  tales  of  magic. 
Heaven's  music,  which  is  order,  seems  unstrung, 
And  this  brave  world 
(The  mystery  of  God,)  unbeautified, 
Disorder'd,  marr'd,  where  such  strange  things  are  acted. 


DEDICATION. 


TO  THE  PUBLISHER. 

Dear  Moxon, 
I  do  not  know  to  whom  a  dedication  of  these  trifles  is  more  properly  due 
than  to  yourself.  You  suggested  the  printing  of  them.  You  were  desirous  of 
exhibiting  a  specimen  of  the  manner  in  which  publications  intrusted  to  your 
future  care  would  appear.  With  more  propriety,  perhaps,  the  "  Christmas," 
or  some  other  of  your  own  simple,  unpretending  compositions,  might  have 
served  this  purpose.  But  I  forget — you  have  bid  a  long  adieu  to  the  muses. 
I  had  on  my  hands  sundry  copies  of  verses  written  for  albums — 

"  Those  books  kept  by  modern  young  ladies  for  show, 
Of  which  their  plaiii  grandmothers  nothing  did  know''— 

or  Otherwise  floating  about  in  periodicals ;  which  you  have  chosen  in  this 
manner  to  imbody.  1  feel  little  interest  in  their  publication.  They  are 
simply — Advertisement  Verses. 

It  IS  not  for  me  nor  you  to  allude  in  public  to  the  kindness  of  our  honoiired 
friend,  under  whose  auspices  you  are  become  a  bookseller.  May  that  line- 
minded  veteran  in  verse  enjoy  life  long  enough  to  see  his  patronage  justitied  ! 
I  venture  to  predict  that  your  habits  of  industry  and  your  cheerful  spirit  will 
carry  you  through  the  world. 

I  am,  dear  Moxon, 

Your  friend  and  sincere  well-wisher, 

CHARLES  LAMB. 
Enfield,  \stJu7ie,  1830. 


ALBUM   VERSES, 
WITH    A     FEW     OTHERS. 


IN  THE  ALBUM  OF  A  CLERGYMAN'S  LADY. 

An  album  is  a  garden,  not  for  show- 
Planted,  but  use  ;  where  wholesome  herbs  should  grow. 
A  cabinet  of  curious  porcelain,  where 
No  fancy  enters,  but  what's  rich  or  rare. 
A  chapel,  where  mere  ornamental  things 
Are  pure  as  crowns  of  saints,  or  angels'  wings. 
A  list  of  living  friends  ;  a  holier  room 
For  names  of  some  since  moulderincr  in  the  tomb, 
Whose  blooming  memories  life's  cold  laws  survive ; 
And,  dead  elsewhere,  they  here  yet  speak  and  live. 
Such,  and  so  tender,  should  an  album  be ; 
And,  lady,  such  I  wish  this  book  to  thee. 


IN  THE  AUTOGRAPH  BOOK  OF  MRS.  SER- 
GEANT W . 

Had  I  a  power,  lady,  to  my  will, 
You  should  not  want  handwritings.     I  would  fill 
Your  leaves  with  autor^raphs — rosplondont  names 
Of  knights  and  squires  of  old,  and  courtly  danies, 
Kings,  emperors,  popes.     Next  under  these  should  stand 
The  hands  of  famous  lawyers — a  grave  band — 
Who,  in  their  courts  of  law  or  equity, 
Have  best  upheld  freedom  and  properly. 
These  should  moot  cases  in  your  book,  and  vie 
To  show  their  reading  and  their  sergeant ry. 
34* 


402  ALBUM    VERSES. 

But  I  have  none  of  these  ;  nor  can  I  send 
The  notes  by  Bullen  to  her  tyrant  penn'd 
In  her  authentic  hand ;  nor  in  soft  hours 
Lines  writ  by  Rosamund  in  Clifford's  bowers. 
The  lack  of  curious  signatures  I  moan, 
And  want  the  courage  to  subscribe  my  own. 


IN  THE  ALBUM  OF  EDITH  S- 


In  Christian  world  Mary  the  garland  wears ! 

Rkbecca  sweetens  on  a  Hebrew's  ear; 

Quakers  for  pure  Priscilla  are  more  clear  ; 

And  the  light  Gaul  by  amorous  Ninon  swears. 

Among  the  lesser  lights  how  Lucy  shines  ! 

What  air  of  fragrance  Rosamond  throws  round  ! 

How  like  a  hymn  doth  sweet  Cecilia  sound ! 

Of  Marthas  and  of  Abigails  few  lines 

Have  bragg'd  in  verse.     Of  coarsest  household  stuff 

Should  homely  Joan  be  fashion'd.     But  can 

You  Barbara  resist,  or  Marian  1 

And  is  not  Clare  for  love  excuse  enough? 

Yet,  by  my  faith  in  numbers,  I  profess, 

These  all  than  Saxon  Edith  please  me  less. 


TO  DORA  W , 

ON    BEING    ASKED    BY    HER    FATHER    TO  WRITE    IN    HER  ALBUM. 

An  album  is  a  banquet :  from  the  store, 
In  his  intelligential  orchard  growing, 
Your  sire  might  heap  your  board  to  overflowing ; 
One  shaking  of  the  tree — 'twould  ask  no  more 
To  set  a  salad  forth,  more  rich  than  that 
Which  Evelyn*  in  his  princely  cookery  fancied  ; 
Or  that  more  rare,  by  Eve's  neat  hands  enhanced, 
Where  a  pleased  guest,  the  angelic  virtue  sat. 

*  Acetaria,  a  Discourse  of  Sallets,  by  J.  E.  1706. 


ALBUM    VERSES.  403 

But  like  the  all-grasping  founder  of  the  feast, 

"Whom  Nathan  to  the  sinning  king  did  tax, 

From  his  less  wealtliy  neighbours  he  exacts  ; 

Spares  his  own  flocks,  and  takes  the  poor  man's  beast. 

Obedient  to  his  bidding,  lo,  I  am 

A  zealous,  meek,  contributory 

Lamb. 


IN  THE  ALBUM  OF  ROTHA  Q- 


A  PASSING  glance  was  all  I  caught  of  thee. 

In  my  own  Enfield  haunts  at  random  roving. 

Old  friends  of  ours  were  with  thee,  faces  loving ; 

Time  short ;  and  salutations  cursory, 

Though  deep  and  hearty.     The  familiar  name 

Of  you,  yet  unfamiliar,  raised  in  me 

Thoughts — what  the  daughter  of  that  man  should  be 

Who   call'd  our  Wordsworth  friend.     My   thoughts   did 

frame 
A  growing  maiden,  who,  from  day  to  day 
Advancing  still  in  stature  and  in  grace. 
Would  all  her  lonely  father's  griefs  efface. 
And  his  paternal  cares  with  usury  pay. 
I  still  retain  the  phantom,  as  I  can  ; 
And  call  the  gentle  image — Quillinan. 


IN  THE  ALBUM  OF  CATHARINE  ORKNEY. 

Canadia  !  boast  no  more  the  toils 
Of  hunters  for  the  furry  spoils  ; 
Your  whitest  ermines  are  but  foils 

To  brighter  Catharine  Orkney. 

'I'hat  such  a  flower  sliould  ever  burst 

From  climes  with  rigorous  winter  cursed! — 

We  bless  you,  that  so  kindly  imrscd 

This  flower,  this  Catharine  Orkney. 


404  ALBUM    VERSES. 

We  envy  not  your  proud  display 

Of  lake — wood — vast  Niagara : 

Your  greatest  pride  we've  borne  away. 

How  spared  you  Catharine  Orkney  ? 

That  Wolfe  on  Heights  of  Abraham  fell 
To  your  reproach  no  more  we  tell : 
Canadia,  you  repaid  us  well 

With  rearing  Catharine  Orkney. 

Oh,  Britain,  guard  with  tenderest  care 
The  charge  allotted  to  your  share  : 
You've  scarce  a  native  maid  so  fair, 

So  good,  as  Catharine  Orkney. 


IN  THE  ALBUM  OF  LUCY  BARTON. 

Little  book,  surnamed  of  white. 
Clean  as  yet,  and  fair  to  sight, 
Keep  thy  attribution  right. 

Never  disproportion'd  scrawl, 
Ugly  blot,  that's  worse  than  all, 
On  thy  maiden  clearness  fall ! 

In  each  letter,  here  design'd, 
Let  the  reader  emblem'd  find 
Neatness  of  the  owner's  mind. 

Gilded  margins  count  a  sin. 
Let  thy  leaves  attraction  win 
By  the  golden  rules  within ; 

Sayings  fetch'd  from  sages  old ; 
Laws  which  Holy  Writ  unfold, 
Worthy  to  be  graved  in  gold ; 

Lighter  fancies  not  excluding ; 
Blameless  wit,  with  nothing  rude  in, 
Sometimes  mildly  interluding 

Amid  strains  of  graver  measure  ; 
Virtue's  self  hath  oft  her  pleasure 
In  sweet  muses'  groves  of  leisure. 


ALBUM    VERSES.  40 

Riddles  dark,  perplexing  sense  ; 

Darker  meanings  of  offence  ; 

What  but  shades — be  banish'd  hence. 

Whitest  thoughts  in  whitest  dress, 
Candid  meanings,  best  express 
Mind  of  quiet  Quakeress. 


IN  THE  ALBUxM  OF  MISS . 

I. 

Such  goodness  in  your  face  doth  shine, 
With  modest  look,  without  design, 
That  I  despair  poor  pen  of  mine 

Can  e'er  express  it. 
To  give  it  words  I  feebly  try ; 
My  spirits  fail  me  to  supply 
Befitting  language  for't,  and  I 

Can  only  bless  it ! 

II. 

Hut  stop,  rash  verse  !   and  don't  abuse 
A  bashful  maiden's  ear  with  news 
Of  her  own  virtues.     She'll  refuse 

Praise  sung  so  loudly. 
Of  that  same  goodness  you  admire, 
The  best  part  is,  she  don't  aspire 
To  praise — nor  of  herself  desire 

To  think  too  proudly. 


IN  THE  ALBUM  OF  MRS.  JANE  TOWERS 

Lady  unknown,  who  crav'.st  from  me  unknown 
The  trifle  of  a  verse  these  leaves  to  grace, 
How  shall  I  find  fit  matter  ?   with  what  face 
Address  a  face  that  ne'er  to  mc  was  shown  ? 
Thy  looks,  tones,  gesture,  manners,  and  what  not. 
Conjecturing,  I  wander  in  the  dark. 


406  ALBUM    VERSES. 

I  know  thee  only  sister  to  Charles  Clarke  ! 
But  at  that  name  my  cold  muse  waxes  hot, 
And  swears  that  thou  art  such  a  one  as  he, 
Warm,  laughter  loving,  with  a  touch  of  madness, 
Wild,  glee-provoking,  pouring  oil  of  gladness 
From  frank  heart  without  guile.     And  if  thou  be 
The  pure  reverse  of  this,  and  I  mistake — 
Demure  one,  1  will  like  thee  for  his  sake. 


IN  MY  OWN  ALBUM. 

Fresh  clad  from  heaven  in  robes  of  white, 

A  young  probationer  of  light. 

Thou  wert,  my  soul,  an  album  bright. 

A  spotless  leaf;  but  thought  and  care, 

And  friend  and  foe,  in  foul  or  fair. 

Have  "  written  strange  defeatures"  there ; 

And  time,  with  heaviest  hand  of  all, 
Like  that  fierce  writing  on  the  wall, 
Hath  stamp'd  sad  dates — he  can't  recall ; 

And  error  gilding  worst  designs — 
Like  speckled  snake  that  strays  and  shines- 
Betrays  his  path  by  crooked  lines  ; 

And  vice  hath  left  his  ugly  blot ; 
And  good  resolves,  a  moment  hot. 
Fairly  began — but  finish'd  not ; 

And  fruitless,  late  remorse  doth  trace — 
Like  Hebrew  lore  a  backward  pace — 
Her  irrecoverable  race. 

Disjointed  numbers  ;  sense  unknit ; 
Huge  reams  of  folly,  shreds  of  wit ; 
Compose  the  mingled  mass  of  it. 

My  scalded  eyes  no  longer  brook 
Upon  this  ink-blurr'd  thing  to  look — 
Go,  shut  the  leaves,  and  clasp  the  book. 


i 


MISCELLANEOUS.  407 


ANGEL  HELP.* 

This  rare  tablet  doth  include 

Poverty  with  sanctitude. 

Past  midnight  this  poor  maid  hath  spun, 

And  yet  the  work  is  not  half  done, 

Which  must  supply,  from  earnings  scant, 

A  feeble  bed-rid  parent's  want. 

Her  sleep-charged  eyes  exemption  ask. 

And  holy  hands  take  up  the  task ; 

Unseen  the  rock  and  spindle  ply, 

And  do  her  earthly  drudgery. 

Sleep,  saintly  poor  one,  sleep,  sleep  on  ; 

And,  waking,  hnd  thy  labours  done. 

Perchance  she  knows  it  by  her  dreams  ; 

Her  eye  hath  caught  the  golden  gleams, 

Angelic  presence  testifying, 

That  round  her  everywhere  are  flying ; 

Ostents  from  which  she  may  presume, 

That  much  of  Heaven  is  in  the  room. 

Skirting  her  own  bright  hair  they  run, 

And  to  the  sunny  add  more  sun  : 

Now  on  that  aged  face  they  fix, 

Streaming  from  the  crucifix  ; 

The  flesh-clogg'd  spirit  disabusing. 

Death-disarming  sleeps  infusing, 

Prelibations,  foretastes  high. 

And  equal  thoughts  to  live  or  die. 

Gardener  from  bright  Eden's  bower, 

Tend  with  care  tliat  lily  flower  ; 

To  its  leaves  and  root  infuse 

Heaven's  sunshine,  heaven's  dews. 

'Tis  a  type,  and  'lis  a  pledge 

Of  a  crowning  privilege. 

(■aroful  as  that  lily  flow«;r, 

'I'his  maid  must  keep  hrr  j)rrcious  dower ; 

Live  a  sainted  maid,  or  die  ^  — 

Martyr  to  virginity. 

*  Suggested  by  a  flrawing  in  the  possession  of  Charles  Adcrs,  Ksq  ,  in 
which  is  represented  the  legend  of  a  poor  female  saint,  who,  havinc  spnn  past 
midnight,  to  maintain  a  bed-rid  mother,  has  fallen  asleep  from  iatiKUc,  and 
angels  are  finishing  her  work.  In  another  part  of  the  chamber  an  angel  it 
lending  a  lily,  the  emblem  of  purity. 


408  MISCELLANEOUS. 


THE  CHRISTENING. 

Array'd — a  half-angelic  sight — 
In  vests  of  pure  baptismal  white, 
The  mother  to  the  font  doth  bring 
The  little  helpless  nameless  thing, 
With  hushes  soft  and  mild  caressing, 
At  once  to  get — a  name  and  blessing. 
Close  by  the  babe  the  priest  doth  stand, 
The  cleansing  water  at  his  hand, 
Which  must  assoil  the  soul  within 
From  every  stain  of  Adam's  sin. 
The  infant  eyes  the  mystic  scenes. 
Nor  knows  what  all  this  wonder  means  ; 
And  now  he  smiles,  as  if  to  say, 
"  I  am  a  Christan  made  this  day  ;" 
Now  frighted  clings  to  nurse's  hold. 
Shrinking  from  the  water  cold. 
Whose  virtues,  rightly  understood, 
Are,  as  Bethesda's  waters,  good. 
Strange  words — the  world,  the  flesh,  the  devil — 
Poor  babe,  what  can  it  know  of  evil  ? 
But  we  must  silently  adore 
Mysterious  truths,  and  not  explore. 
Enough  for  him  in  after  times, 
When  he  shall  read  these  artless  rhymes. 
If,  looking  back  upon  this  day 
With  quiet  conscience,  he  can  say, 
"  I  have  in  part  redeem'd  the  pledge 
Of  my  baptismal  privilege  ; 
And  more  and  more  will  strive  to  flee 
All  which  my  sponsors  kind  did  then  renounce  for  me." 


ON  AN  INFANT  DYING  AS  SOON  AS  BORN. 

I  SAW  where  in  the  shroud  did  lurk 
A  curious  frame  of  nature's  work. 


MISCELLANEOUS.  409 

A.  floweret  crush'd  in  the  bud, 
A  nameless  piece  of  babyhood, 
Was  in  her  cradle  coffin  lying; 
Extinct,  with  scarce  the  sense  of  dying  : 
So  soon  lo  excliange  the  imprisoning  womb 
For  darker  closets  of  the  tomb  ! 
She  did  but  ope  an  eye,  and  put 
A  clear  beam  forth,  then  straight  up  shut 
For  the  long  dark,  ne'er  more  to  see 
Through  glasses  of  mortality. 
Riddle  of  destiny,  who  can  show 
What  thy  short  visit  meant,  or  know 
What  thy  errand  here  below  ? 
Shall  we  say  that  Nature  blind 
Check'd  her  hand  and  changed  her  mind, 
Just  when  she  had  exactly  wrought 
A  finish'd  pattern  without  fault? 
Could  she  flag,  or  could  she  tire, 
Or  lack'd  she  the  Promethean  fire 
(With  her  nine  moons'  long  working  sicken'd) 
That  should  thy  little  limbs  have  quicken'd  ? 
Limbs  so  firm,  they  seemed  to  assure 
Life  of  health  and  days  mature  : 
Woman's  self  in  miniature  ! 
Limbs  so  fair,  they  might  supply 
(Themselves  now  but  cold  imagery) 
The  sculptor  to  make  beauty  by. 
Or  did  the  stern-eyed  fate  descry, 
That  babe,  or  mother,  one  must  die  ; 
So  in  mercy  left  the  stock, 
And  cut  tlie  branch  ;  to  save  the  shock 
Of  young  years  widow'd  ;  and  the  pain, 
When  single  state  comes  back  again 
To  the  lone  man  who,  'reft  of  wife. 
Thenceforward  drags  a  maimed  life  ? 
The  economy  of  Heaven  is  dark  ; 
And  wisest  ch-rks  Iiave  niiss'd  the  mark. 
Why  human  buds,  like  this,  should  fall. 
More  brief  than  fly  ephemeral, 
That  has  liis  dav  ;   whih;  shrivell'd  crones 
Stid'en  with  age  to  slocks  and  stones; 
And  crabbed  use  the  conscience  sears 
In  sinners  of  a  hundred  years. 
JNIother's  prattle,  mother's  kiss, 
Baby  fond,  thou  ne'er  wilt  miss. 
Vol.  T— 35  S 


410  MISCELLANEOUS. 

Rites  which  custom  does  impose, 

Silver  bells  and  baby  clothes  ; 

Coral  redder  than  those  lips, 

Which  pale  death  did  late  eclipse  ; 

Music  framed  for  infants'  glee, 

Whistle  never  tuned  for  thee  ; 

Though  thou  want'st  not,  thou  shall  have  them 

Loving  hearts  were  they  which  gave  them. 

Let  not  one  be  missing  ;  nurse. 

See  them  laid  upon  the  hearse 

Of  infant  slain  by  doom  perverse. 

Why  should  kings  and  nobles  have 

Pictured  trophies  to  their  grave  ; 

And  we,  churls,  to  thee  deny 

Thy  pretty  toys  with  thee  to  lie, 

A  more  harmless  vanity  ? 


THE  YOUNG  CATECHIST.* 

While  this  tawny  Ethiop  prayeth. 

Painter,  who  is  she  that  stayeth 

By,  with  skin  of  whitest  lustre, 

Sunny  locks,  a  shining  cluster, 

Saint-like  seeming  to  direct  him 

To  the  Power  that  must  protect  him  ? 

Is  she  of  the  heaven-born  three, 

Meek  Hope,  strong  Faith,  sweet  Charity  ; 

Or  some  cherub  ? 

They  you  mention 
Far  transcend  my  weak  invention. 
'Tis  a  simple  (Christian  child. 
Missionary  young  and  mild, 
From  her  stock  of  Scriptural  knowledge, 
Bible-taught  without  a  college. 
Which  by  reading  she  could  gather, 
Teaches  him  to  say  Our  Father 
To  the  common  Parent,  who 
Colour  not  respects,  nor  hue. 
White  and  black  in  him  have  part, 
Who  looks  not  to  the  skin,  but  heart. 

*  A  picture  by  Henry  Meyer,  Esq. 


MISCELLiNEOUS  411 


SHE  IS  GOING. 

For  their  elder  sister's  hair 
Martha  does  a  wreath  prepare 
Of  bridal  rose,  ornate  and  gay : 
To-morrow  is  the  wedding-day  : 

She  is  going. 

Mary,  youngest  of  the  three, 
Laughing  idler,  full  of  glee, 
Arm  in  arm  does  fondly  chain  her, 
Thinking,  poor  trifler,  to  detain  her — 
But  she's  going. 

Vex  not,  maidens,  nor  regret 
Thus  to  part  with  Margaret. 
Charms  like  yours  can  never  stay 
Long  within  doors  ;  and  one  day 

You'll  be  going. 


TO  A  YOUNG  FRIEND, 

ON    HER   TWENTY-FIRST    BIRTHDAY. 

Crown  me  a  cheerful  goblet,  while  I  pray 
A  blessing  on  thy  years,  young  Isola ; 
Young,  but  no  more  a  child.      How  swift  have  flown 
To  me  tliy  girlish  times,  a  wom.in  grown 
Beneath  my  heedless  eyes  !  in  vain  1  rack 
My  fancy  to  believe  the  almanac, 

That  speaks  thee  twenty-one.     Thou  shouldst  have  still 
Remain'd  a  child,  and  at  thy  sovereign  will 
Gamboird  about  our  house,  as  in  times  past. 
Ungrateful  Emma,  to  grow  up  so  fast, 
Hastening  to  leave  thy  friends  ! — for  which  intent, 
Fond  runagate,  be  this  thy  punishment. 
After  some  thirty  years,  spent  in  such  bliss 
As  this  earth  can  afford,  where  still  we  miss 
S  2 


412  SONNETS. 

Something  of  joy  entire,  mayst  thou  grow  old 

A.S  we  whom  thou  has  left !     That  wish  was  cold. 

Oh  far  more  aged  and  wrinkled,  till  folks  say, 

Looking  upon  thee  reverend  in  decay, 

*'  This  dame  for  length  of  days  and  virtues  rare. 

With  her  respected  grandsire  may  compare." 

Grandchild  of  that  respected  Isola, 

Thou  shouldst  have  had  about  thee  on  this  day 

Kind  looks  of  parents,  to  congratulate 

Their  pride  grown  up  to  woman's  grave  estate  ; 

But  they  have  died,  and  left  thee  to  advance 

Thy  fortunes  how  thou  mayst,  and  owe  to  chance 

The  friends  which  nature  grudged.     And  thou  wilt  find, 

Or  make  such,  Emma,  if  I  am  not  blind 

To  thee  and  thy  deservings.     That  last  strain 

Had  too  much  sorrow  in  it.     Fill  again 

Another  cheerful  goblet,  while  I  say, 

"  Health,  and  twice  health,  to  our  lost  Isola." 


HARMONY  IN  UNLIKENESS. 

By  Enfield  lanes  and  Winchmore's  verdant  hill, 
Two  lovely  damsels  cheer  my  lonely  walk  : 
The  fair  Maria,  as  a  vestal  still. 
And  Emma  brown,  exuberant  in  talk. 
With  soft  and  lady  speech  the  first  applies 
The  mild  correctives  that  to  grace  belong 
To  her  redundant  friend,  who  her  defies 
With  jest,  and  mad  discourse,  and  burst  of  song. 
Oh  diff*ering  pair,  yet  sweetly  thus  agreeing. 
What  music  from  your  happy  discord  rises, 
While  your  companion  hearing  each,  and  seeing, 
Nor  this,  nor  that,  but  both  together,  prizes  ; 
This  lesson  teaching,  which  our  souls  may  strike, 
That  harmonies  may  be  in  things  milike  ! 


SONNETS.  413 


WRITTEN  AT  CAMBRIDGE. 

I  WAS  not  train'd  in  academic  bowers, 

And  to  those  learned  streams  I  nothing  owe 

Which  copious  from  those  twin  fair  founts  do  flow ; 

Mine  have  been  anything  but  studious  hours. 

Yet  can  I  fancy,  wandering  mid  thy  towers, 

Myself  a  nursling,  Granta,  of  thy  lap  ; 

My  brow  seems  tight'ning  with  the  doctors  cap, 

And  I  walk  gotcmed  ;  feel  unusual  powers. 

Strange  forms  of  logic  clothe  my  admiring  speech 

Old  Ramus'  ghost  is  busy  at  my  brain. 

And  my  scull  teems  with  notions  infinite. 

Be  still,  ye  reeds  of  Camus,  while  I  teach 

Truths  which  transcend  the  searching  schoolmen's  vein, 

And  half  had  stagger'd  that  stout  Stagirite  ! 


TO  A  CELEBRATED  FEMALE  PERFORMER  IN 
THE  "BLIND  BOY." 

Rare  artist !  who  with  half  thy  tools,  or  none, 
Canst  execute  with  ease  thy  curious  art, 
And  press  thy  powerful'st  meanings  on  the  heart, 
Unaided  by  the  eye,  expression's  throne  ! 
While  each  blind  sense,  intelligential  grown 
Beyond  its  sphere,  performs  the  effect  of  sight: 
Those  orbs  alone,  wanting  their  proper  miglit, 
All  motionless  and  silent  seem  to  moan 
The  unseemly  negliijence  of  nature's  hand, 
That  left  them  so  lorlorn.      What  praise  is  thine, 
Oh  mistress  of  the  passions  !   artist  fine  ! 
Who  dost  our  souls  against  our  sense  command. 
Plucking  thn  horror  from  a  sightless  face. 
Lending  to  blank  deformity  a  grace. 
35* 


414 


SONNETS. 


WORK. 

Who  first  invented  work,  and  bound  the  free 

And  holyday-rejoicing  spirit  down 

To  the  ever-haunting  impunity 

Of  business  in  the  green  fields,  and  the  town — 

To  plough,  loom,  anvil,  spade — and  oh!  most  sad, 

To  that  dry  drudgery  at  the  desk's  dead  wood  ? 

Who  but  the  being  unbless'd,  alien  from  good, 

Sabbathless  Satan  !  he  who  his  unglad 

Task  ever  plies  mid  rotatory  burnings, 

That  round  and  round  incalculably  reel — 

For  wrath  divine  hath  made  him  like  a  wheel — 

In  that  red  realm  from  which  are  no  returnings  ; 

Where  toiling,  and  turmoiling,  ever  and  aye 

He  and  his  thoughts  keep  pensive  working-day. 


LEISURE. 

They  talk  of  time,  and  of  time's  galling  yoke, 
That  like  a  mill-stone  on  man's  mind  doth  press. 
Which  only  works  and  business  can  redress  : 
Of  divine  leisure  such  foul  lies  are  spoke. 
Wounding  her  fair  gifts  with  calumnious  stroke 
But  might  I,  fed  with  silent  meditation, 
Assoiled  live  from  that  fiend  occupation — 
Jmprohus  Labor,  which  my  spirits  hath  broke — 
I'd  drink  of  time's  rich  cup,  and  never  surfeit  : 
Fling  in  more  days  than  went  to  make  the  gem, 
That  crown'd  the  white  top  of  Methusalem  : 
Yea,  on  my  weak  neck  take,  and  never  forfeit. 
Like  Atlas  bearing  up  the  dainty  sky, 
The  heaven-sweet  burden  of  eternity. 

DEUS    NOBIS    UJEC    OTIA    FECIT. 


SONNETS.  415 


TO  SAMUEL  ROGERS,  ESQ. 

Rogers,  of  all  the  men  that  I  have  known 

But  slightly,  who  have  died,  your  brother's  loss 

Touch'd  me  most  sensibly.     There  came  across 

My  mind  an  image  of  the  cordial  tone 

Of  your  fraternal  meetings,  where  a  guest 

I  more  than  once  have  sat ;  and  grieve  to  think, 

That  of  that  threefold  cord  one  precious  link 

By  Death's  rude  hand  is  sever'd  from  the  rest. 

Of  our  old  gentry  he  appear'd  a  stem — 

A  magistrate  who,  while  the  evil-doer 

He  kept  in  terror,  could  respect  the  poor, 

And  not  for  every  trifle  harass  them, 

As  some  divine,  and  laic,  too  oft  do. 

This  man's  a  private  loss,  and  public  too. 


THE  GIPSY'S  MALISON. 

*'  Suck,  baby,  suck,  mother's  love  grows  by  giving, 
Drain  the  sweet  founts  that  only  thrive  by  wasting  ; 
Black  manhood  comes,  when  riotous  guilty  living 
Hands  thee  the  cup  that  shall  be  death  in  tasting. 

Kiss,  baby,  kiss,  mother's  lips  shine  by  kisses, 
Choke  the  warm  breath  that  else  would  fall  in  blessings; 
Black  manhood  comes,  when  turbulent  guihy  blisses 
Tend  thee  the  kiss  that  poisons  mid  caressings. 

Hang,  baby,  hang,  mother's  love  loves  such  forces, 
Strain  the  fond  neck  lliat  bends  still  to  tliv  clinging; 
Black  manhood  conies,  wh(ui  violent  lawh^ss  courses 
Leave  thee  a  spectacle  in  rude  air  swinging." 

So  sang  a  wither'd  beldam  energetical, 

And  bann'd  the  ungiving  door  with  lips  prophetical. 


416  COMMENDATORY    VERSES. 


TO  THE  AUTHOR  OF  POEMS, 

PUBLISHED    UNDER    THE    NAME    OF    BARRY    CORNWALL. 

Let  hate  or  grosser  heats  their  foulness  mask 
Under  the  vizor  of  a  borrowed  name  ; 
Let  things  eschew  the  light  deserving  blame  : 
No  cause  hast  thou  to  blush  for  thy  sweet  task. 
"  Marcian  Colonna"  is  a  dainty  book  ; 
And  thy  "  Sicilian  Tale"  may  boldly  pass  ; 
Thy  "  Dream"  'bove  all,  in  which,  as  in  a  glass, 
On  the  great  world's  antique  glories  we  may  look. 
No  longer,  then,  as  "  lowly  substitute, 
Factor,  or  Proctor,  for  another's  gains," 
Suffer  the  admiring  world  to  be  deceived ; 
Lest  thou  thyself,  by  self  of  fame  bereaved, 
Lament  too  late  the  lost  prize  of  thy  pains, 
And  heavenly  tunes  piped  through  an  alien  flute. 


TO  J.  S.  KNOWLES,  ESQ., 

ON  HIS  tragedy  of  virginius. 

Twelve  years  ago  I  knew  thee,  Knowles,  and  then 

Esteemed  you  a  perfect  specimen 

Of  those  fine  spirits  warm-soul'd  Ireland  sends 

To  teach  us  colder  English  how  a  friend's 

Quick  pulse  should  beat.     I  knew  you  brave,  and  plain, 

Strong-sensed,  rough-witted,  above  fear  or  gain  ; 

But  nothing  further  had  the  gift  to  espy. 

Sudden  you  reappear.     With  wonder  I 

Hear  my  old  friend  (turn'd  Shakspeare)  read  a  scene 

Only  to  his  inferior  in  the  clean 

Passes  of  pathos  :  with  such  fence-like  art — 

Ere  we  can  see  the  steel,  'tis  in  our  heart. 

Almost  without  the  aid  language  affords, 

Your  piece  seems  wrought.     That  hufBng  medium,  vyords 

(Which  in  the  modern  Tamburlaines  quite  sway 

Our  shamed  souls  from  their  bias,)  in  your  play 


COMMENDATORY    VERSES.  417 

We  scarce  attend  to.     Hastier  passion  draws 

Our  tears  on  credit :  and  we  find  the  cause 

Some  two  hours  after,  spelling  o'er  again 

Those  strange  few  words  at  ease,  that  wrought  the  pain. 

Proceed,  old  friend  ;  and,  as  the  year  returns, 

Still  snatch  some  new  old  story  from  the  urns 

Of  long-dead  virtue.     We,  that  knew  before 

Your  worth,  may  admire,  we  cannot  love  you  more. 


TO  THE  EDITOR  OF  THE  "  EVERY-DAY  BOOK." 

I  LIKE  you  and  your  book,  ingenuous  Hone  ! 

In  whose  capacious,  all-embracing  leaves 
The  very  marrow  of  tradition's  shown  ; 

And  all  that  history — much  that  fiction — weaves 

By  every  sort  of  taste  your  work  is  graced. 

Vast  stores  of  modem  anecdote  we  find, 
With  good  old  story  quaintly  interlaced — 

The  theme  as  various  as  the  reader's  mind. 

Rome's  lie-fraught  legends  you  so  truly  paint — 
Yet  kindly — that  the  half-turn'd  Catholic 

Scarcely  forbears  to  smile  at  his  own  saint, 
And  cannot  curse  the  candid  heretic. 

Rags,  relics,  witches,  ghosts,  fiends,  crowd  your  page  ; 

Our  fathers'  mummeries  we  well-pleased  behold, 
And,  proudly  conscious  of  a  purer  age. 

Forgive  some  fopperies  in  the  times  of  old. 

Verse-honouring  PhcEl)U8,  father  of  bright  (hiys, 
Must  needs  bestow  on  you  both  good  and  many, 

Who,  building  tro[)hies  of  his  children's  praise, 
Run  their  rich  Zodiac  through,  not  missing  any. 

Dan  Phoebus  loves  your  book — trust  me,  friend  Hone — 

The  title  only  errs,  he  bids  inc  sny  : 
For  while  such  art,  wit,  reading,  there  are  shown, 

He  swears  'tis  not  a  work  o(  every  day. 
S  3 


418  TO    A    FRIEND    ON    HIS    MARRIAGE. 


TO  T.  STOTHARD,  ESQ., 

ON    HIS    ILLUSTRATIONS    OF    THE    POEMS    OF    MR.    ROGERS. 

Consummate  artist,  whose  undying  name 

With  clpssic  Rogers'  shall  go  down  to  fame, 

Be  this  thy  crowning  work !     In  my  young  days 

How  often  have  I,  with  a  child's  fond  gaze, 

Pored  on  the  pictured  wonders*  thou  hadst  done : 

Clarissa  mournful,  and  prim  Grandison ! 

All  Fielding's,  Smollett's  heroes,  rose  to  view  ; 

I  saw,  and  I  believed  the  phantoms  true. 

But,  above  all,  that  most  romantic  talef 

Did  o'er  my  rude  credulity  prevail, 

Where  glums  and  gawries  wear  mysterious  things, 

That  serve  at  once  for  jackets  and  for  wings. 

Age,  that  enfeebles  other  men's  designs. 

But  heightens  thine,  and  thy  free  draught  refines. 

In  several  ways  distinct  you  make  us  feel 

Graceful  as  Raphael,  as  Watteau  genteel. 

Your  lights  and  shades,  as  Titianesque,  we  praise ; 

And  warmly  wish  you  Titian's  length  of  days. 


TO  A  FRIEND  ON  HIS  MARRIAGE. 

What  makes  a  happy  wedlock  ?     What  has  fate 

Not  given  to  thee  in  thy  well-chosen  mate  ? 

Good  sense- — good-humour ;  these  are  trivial  things, 

Dear  M ,  that  each  trite  encomiast  sings. 

But  she  hath  these,  and  more.     A  mind  exempt 
From  every  low-bred  passion,  where  contempt, 
Nor  envy,  nor  detraction,  ever  found 
A  harbour  yet ;  an  understanding  sound  ; 
Just  views  of  right  and  wrong ;  perception  full 
Of  the  deform'd,  and  of  the  beautiful, 
In  life  and  manners  ;  wit  above  her  sex. 
Which,  as  a  gem,  her  sprightly  converse  decks  ; 

•^  Illustrations  of  the  British  Novelists.        t  Peter  Wilkins. 


THE    SELF-ENCHANTED.  419 

Exuberant  fancies,  prodigal  of  mirth, 
To  gladden  woodland  walk  or  winter  hearth  ; 
k  noble  nature,  conqueror  in  the  strife 
Of  conflict  with  a  hard  discouraging  life. 
Strengthening  the  veins  of  virtue,  past  the  power 
Of  those  whose  days  have  been  one  silken  hour, 
Spoil'd  fortune's  pamper'd  offspring ;  a  keen  sense 
Alike  of  benefit  and  of  offence, 
With  reconcilement  quick,  that  instant  springs 
From  the  charged  heart  with  nimble  angel  wings ; 
While  grateful  feelings,  like  a  signet  sign'd 
By  a  strong  hand,  seem  burnt  into  her  mind. 
If  these,  dear  friend,  a  dowry  can  confer 
Richer  than  land,  thou  hast  them  all  in  her  ; 
And  beauty,  which  some  hold  the  chiefest  boon, 
Is  in  thy  bargain  for  a  make-weight  thrown. 


THE  SELF-ENCHANTED. 

I  HA.D  a  sense  in  dreams  of  a  beauty  rare. 

Whom  fate  had  spell-bound,  and  rooted  there, 

Stooping,  like  some  enchanted  theme, 

Over  the  marge  of  that  crystal  stream. 

Where  the  blooming  Greek,  to  Echo  blind, 

With  self-love  fond,  had  to  waters  pined. 

Ages  had  waked,  and  ages  slept, 

And  that  bending  posture  still  she  kept : 

For  her  eyes  she  may  not  turn  away, 

Till  a  fairer  object  shall  pass  that  way — 

Till  an  image  more  beauteous  this  world  can  show, 

Than  her  own  which  she  sees  in  the  nurror  below. 

Pore  on,  fair  creature  !   for  ever  pore, 

Nor  dream  to  be  disenchanted  more  ; 

For  vain  is  expectance,  and  wish  is  vain, 

Till  a  new  Narcissus  can  come  again. 


420  OH  LIFT    WITH    REVERENT    HAND. 


TO  LOUISA  M ,  WHOM  I  USED  TO  CALL 

'•  MONKEY." 

Louisa,  serious  grown  and  mild, 
1  knew  you  once  a  romping  cliild, 
Obstreperous  much,  and  very  wild. 
Then  you  would  clamber  up  my  knees. 
And  strive  with  every  art  to  tease. 
When  every  art  of  yours  could  please. 
Those  things  would  scarce  be  proper  now. 
But  they  are  gone,  I  know  not  how. 
And  woman's  written  on  your  brow* 
Time  draws  his  linger  o'er  the  scene  ; 
But  1  cannot  forget  between 
The  thing  to  me  you  once  have  been ; 
Each  sportive  sally,  wild  escape, 
The  scoff,  the  banter,  and  the  jape. 
And  antics  of  my  gamesome  ape. 


[In  a  leaf  of  a  quarto  edition  of  the  "  Lives  of  the  Saints,  written  in  Span- 
ish by  the  learned  and  reverend  father,  Alfonso  Villegas,  Divine,  of  the  Order 
of  St.  Dominic,  set  forth  in  English  by  John  Heigham,  Anno  1630,"  bought 
at  a  Catholic  bookshop  in  Duke-street,  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  I  found,  care- 
fully inserted,  a  painted  flower,  seemingly  coeval  with  the  book  itself;  and 
did  not,  for  some  time,  discover  that  it  opened  in  the  middle,  and  was  the 
cover  to  a  very  humble  draught  of  a  St.  Anne,  with  the  Virgin  and  Child  ; 
doubtless  the  performance  of  some  poor  but  pious  Catholic,  whose  medita- 
tions it  assisted.] 

Oh  lift  with  reverent  hand  that  tarnish'd  flower,^ 

That  'shrines  beneath  her  modest  canopy 

Memorials  dear  to  Romish  piety ; 

Dim  specks,  rude  shapes,  of  saints  !  in  fervent  hour 

The  work,  perchance,  of  some  meek  devotee, 

Who,  poor  in  worldly  treasures  to  set  forth 

The  sanctities  she  worshipp'd  to  their  worth, 

In  this  imperfect  tracery  might  see 

Hints,  that  all  heaven  did  to  her  sense  reveal. 

Cheap  gifts  best  fit  poor  givers.     We  are  told 

Of  the  lone  mite,  the  cup  of  water  cold, 

That  in  their  way  approved  the  offerer's  zeal. 

True  love  shows  costliest  where  the  means  are  scant ; 

And,  in  her  reckoning,  they  abound  who  want. 


TRANSLATIONS, 

FROM  THE  LATIN  OF  VINCENT  BOURNE. 


I. 

ON  A  SEPULCHRAL  STATUE  OF  AN  INFANT 
SLEEPING. 

Beautiful  infant,  who  dost  keep 

Thy  posture  here,  and  sleep'st  a  marble  sleep, 

May  the  repose  unbroken  be, 

Which  the  fine  artist's  hand  hath  lent  to  thee, 

While  thou  enjoy 'st,  along  with  it, 

That  which  no  art  or  craft  could  ever  hit, 

Or  counterfeit  to  mortal  sense, 

The  heaven-infused  sleep  of  innocence  ! 


IF. 

THE  RIVAL  BELLS. 

A  TUNEFUL  challen«ir(!  rings  from  either  side 

Of  Thames'  fair  banks.      'I'liy   twice   six  bells,  Saint 

Bride, 
Peal  swift  and  shrill  ;  to  whicli  more  slow  reply 
The  deep-toned  eight  of  Mary  Overy. 
Such  harmony  from  the  contention  flows, 
That  tlie  divided  ear  no  prcferLiice  knows  ; 
Between  them  both  disparting  music's  state. 
While  one  exceeds  in  number,  one  in  weight. 
36 


422  TRANSLATIONS. 


III. 

EPITAPH  ON  A  DOG. 

Poor  Irus'  faithful  wolf-dog  here  I  lie, 

That  wont  to  tend  ray  old  blind  master's  steps, 

His  guide  and  guard ;  nor,  while  my  service  lasted, 

Had  he  occasion  for  that  staff  with  which 

He  now  goes  picking  out  his  path  in  fear 

Over  the  highways  and  crossings,  but  would  plant, 

Safe  in  the  conduct  of  my  friendly  string, 

A  firm  foot  forward  still,  till  he  had  reach'd 

His  poor  seat  on  some  stone,  nigh  where  the  tide 

Of  passers-by  in  thickest  confluence  flow'd  : 

To  whom  with  loud  and  passionate  laments 

From  morn  to  eve  his  dark  estate  he  wail'd. 

Nor  wail'd  to  all  in  vain :  some  here  and  there, 

The  well  disposed  and  good,  their  pennies  gave. 

I  meantime  at  his  feet  obsequious  slept ; 

Not  all-asleep  in  sleep,  but  heart  and  ear 

Prick'd  up  at  his  least  motion,  to  receive 

At  his  kind  hand  my  customary  crumbs, 

And  common  portion  in  his  feast  of  scraps  ; 

Or  when  night  warn'd  us  homeward,  tired  and  spent 

With  our  long  day  and  tedious  beggary. 

These  were  my  manners,  this  my  way  of  life, 

Till  age  and  slow  disease  me  overtook. 

And  sever'd  from  my  sightless  master's  side. 

But  lest  the  grace  of  so  good  deeds  should  die, 

Through  tracts  of  years  in  mute  oblivion  lost, 

This  slender  tomb  of  turf  hath  Irus  rear'd. 

Cheap  monument  of  no  ungrudging  hand, 

And  with  short  verse  inscribed  it,  to  attest, 

In  long  and  lasting  union  to  attest, 

The  virtues  of  the  beggar  and  his  dog. 


TRANSLATIONS.  423 


IV. 

THE  BALLAD-SINGERS. 

Where  seven  fair  streets  to  one  tall  column*  draw, 

Two  nymphs  have  ta'en  their  stand,  in  hats  of  straw ; 

Their  yellower  necks  huge  beads  of  amber  grace, 

And  by  their  trade  they're  of  the  sirens'  race  : 

With  cloak  loose-pinn'd  on  each,  that  has  been  red. 

But,  long  with  dust  and  dirt  discoloured, 

Belies  its  hue  ;  in  mud  behind,  before. 

From  heel  to  middle  leg  becrusted  o'er. 

One  a  small  infant  at  the  breast  does  bear ; 

And  one  in  her  right  hand  her  tuneful  ware. 

Which  she  would  vend.     Their  station  scarce  is  taken, 

AVhen  youths  and  maids  flock  round.    His  stall  forsaken, 

Forth  comes  a  son  of  Crispin,  leathern-capp'd, 

Prepared  to  buy  a  ballad,  if  one  apt 

To  move  his  fancy  offers.     Crispin's  sons 

Have,  from  uncounted  time,  with  ale  and  buns 

Cherish'd  the  gift  of  song^  which  sorrow  quells  ; 

And,  working  single  in  their  low-roof'd  cells. 

Oft  cheat  the  tedium  of  a  winter's  night 

With  anthems  warbled  in  the  muses'  spight. 

Who  now  hath  caught  the  alarm  ?  the  servant-maid 

Hath  heard  a  buzz  at  distance  ;  and  afraid 

To  miss  a  note,  with  elbows  red  comes  out. 

Leaving  his  forge  to  cool,  Pyracmon  stout 

Thrusts  in  his  unwash'd  visage.     He  stands  by, 

Who  the  hard  trade  of  porterage  does  j)ly 

With  stooping  shoulders.      What  cares  he  ?  he  sees 

The  assembled  ring,  nor  heeds  his  tottering  knees. 

But  pricks  liis  oars  up  with  tin.'  ho|)es  of  song. 

So,  while  the  Bard  ol  Khodope  liis  wrong 

Bewail'd  to  Proserpine  on  Thracian  strings, 

The  tasks  of  gloomy  Orc\is  lost  their  slings, 

The  stonc-vex'd  Sysiphus  forgets  his  load. 

Hither  and  thither  from  the  sevenfold  road 

Some  cart  or  wagon  crosses,  which  divides 

The  close-wedged  audience ;  but,  as  when  the  tides 

♦  Seven  dials. 


424  TRANSLATIONS.  j 

i 

To  ploughing  ships  give  way,  the  ship  being  past, 

They  reunite,  so  these  unite  as  fast. 

The  older  songstress  hitherto  hath  spent 

Her  elocution  in  the  argument 

Of  their  great  song  in  prose;  to  wit,  the  woes 

Which  maiden  true  to  faithless  sailor  owes — 

Ah !  "  Wandering  HeT — which  now  in  loftier  verse 

Pathetic  they  alternately  rehearse. 

All  gaping  wait  the  event.     This  critic  opes  1 

His  right  ear  to  the  strain.     The  other  hopes 

To  catch  it  better  with  his  l^t.     Long  trade 

It  were  to  tell,  how  the  deluded  maid 

A  victim  fell.     And  now  right  greedily 

All  hands  are  stretching  forth  the  songs  to  buy, 

That  are  so  tragical ;  which  she,  and  she. 

Deals  out,  and  sings  the  while  ;  nor  can  there  be 

A  breast  so  obdurate  here,  that  will  hold  back 

His  contributions  from  the  gentle  rack 

Of  music's  pleasing  torture.     Irus'  self. 

The  staff-propp'd  beggar,  his  thin-gotten  pelf 

Brings  out  from  pouch,  where  squalid  farthings  rest, 

And  boldlv  claims  his  ballad  with  the  best. 

An  old  dame  only  lingers.     To  her  purse 

The  penny  sticks.     At  length,  with  harmless  curse, 

"  Give  me,"  she  cries.     "  I'll  paste  it  on  my  wall, 

While  the  wall  lasts,  to  show  what  ills  befall 

Fond  hearts,  seduced  from  innocency's  way ; 

How  maidens  fall,  and  mariners  betray." 


TO  DAVID  COOK, 

OF    THF,    PARISH    OF    SAINT    MARGAREt's,    WESTMINSTER, 
WATCHMAN. 

For  much  good-natured  verse  received  from  thee, 

A  loving  verse  take  in  return  from  me. 

"  Good-morrow  to  my  masters,"  is  your  cry ; 

And  to  our  David  "  twice  as  good,"  say  I. 

Not  Peter's  monitor,  shrill  chanticleer. 

Crows  the  approach  of  dawn  in  notes  more  clear, 


TRANSLATIONS.  425 

Or  tells  the  hours  more  faithfully.     While  night 
Fills  half  the  world  with  shadows  of  affright, 
You  with  your  lantern,  partner  of  your  round, 
Traverse  the  paths  of  Margaret's  hallow'd  bound. 
The  tales  of  ghosts  which  old  wives'  ears  drink  up, 
The  drunkard  reeling  home  from  tavern  cup, 
Nor  prowling  robber,  your  firm  soul  appal ; 
Arm'd  with  thy  faithful  staff,  thou  slight'st  them  all. 
But  if  the  market  gard'ner  chance  to  pass. 
Bringing  to  town  his  fruit,  or  early  grass, 
The  gentle  salesman  you  with  candour  greet, 
And  with  reit'rated  "good-mornings"  meet. 
Announcing  your  approach  by  formal  bell, 
Of  nightly  weather  you  the  changes  tell ; 
Whether  the  moon  shines,  or  her  head  doth  steep 
In  rain-portending  clouds.     When  mortals  sleep 
In  downy  rest,  you  brave  the  snows  and  sleet 
Of  winter ;  and  in  alley,  or  in  street, 
Relieve  your  midnight  progress  with  a  verse. 
What  thougrh  fastidious  Phcebus  frown  averse 
On  your  didactic  strain — indulgent  night 
With  caution  hath  seal'd  up  both  ears  of  spite, 
And  critics  sleep  while  you  in  staves  do  sound 
The  praise  of  long-dead  saints,  whose  days  abound 
In  wintry  monthn  ;  but  Crispin  chief  proclaim  : 
Who  stirs  not  at  that  prince  of  cobblers'  name  ? 
Profuse  in  lo3'alty  some  couplets  shine. 
And  wish  long  davs  to  all  the  Brunswick  line ! 
To  youths  and  virgins  they  chaste  lessons  read  ; 
Teach  wives  and  husbands  how  their  lives  to  lead; 
Maids  to  be  cleanly,  footmen  free  from  vice  ; 
How  death  at  last  all  ranks  doth  equalize  ; 
And,  in  conclusion,  pray  good  years  befall, 
With  store  of  wealth,  your  "  worthy  masters  all." 
For  this  and  other  tokens  of  good-will, 
On  boxing  day  may  store  of  shillings  Mill 
Your  Christmas  purse  ;  no  householder  give  loss, 
When  at  each  door  your  hlainclfss  suit  you  press: 
And  what  you  wish  to  us  (it  is  but  reason) 
Receive  in  turn — the  compliment?  o'  th'  season! 
36* 


426  TRANSLATIONS. 


1 


VI. 

ON  A  DEAF  AND  DUMB  ARTIST .♦ 

And  hath  thy  blameless  life  become 
A  prey  to  the  devouring  tomb  ? 
A  more  mute  silence  hast  thou  known, 
A  deafness  deeper  than  thine  own, 
While  time  was  ?  and  no  friendly  muse, 
That  markM  thy  life,  and  knows  thy  dues, 
Repair  with  quickening  verse  the  breach, 
And  write  thee  into  light  and  speech  ? 
The  Power  that  made  the  tongue  restrained 
Thy  lips  from  lies  and  speeches  feign'd ; 
Who  made  the  hearing,  without  wrong 
Did  rescue  thine  from  siren's  song. 
He  let  thee  see  the  ways  of  men. 
Which  thou  with  pencil,  not  with  pen, 
Careful  beholder,  down  didst  note. 
And  all  their  motley  actions  quote, 
Thyself  unstain'd  the  while.     From  look 
Or  gesture  reading,  more  than  book^ 
In  lettered  pride  thou  took'st  no  part. 
Contented  with  the  silent  art, 
Thyself  as  silent.     Might  I  be 
As  speechless,  deaf,  and  good  as  he ! 


VII. 
NEWTON'S  PRINCIPIA. 

Great  Newton's  self,  to  whom  the  world's  in  debt, 
Owed  to  schoolmistress  sage  his  alphabet ; 
But  quickly  wiser  than  his  teacher  grown, 
Discover'd  properties  to  her  unknown  ; 
Of  A  plus  B,  or  minus,  learn'd  the  use, 
Known  quantities  from  unknown  to  educe ; 

♦  Benjamin  Ferrers— Died  A.  D.  1732. 


TRANSLATIONS.  427 

And  made — no  doubt,  to  that  old  dame's  surprise — 
The  Christcross-row  his  ladder  to  the  skies. 
Yet,  whatsoe'er  geometricians  say, 
Her  lessons  were  his  true  Principia  ! 


VIII. 

THE  HOUSEKEEPER. 

The  frugal  snail,  with  forecast  of  repose, 
Carries  his  house  with  him  where'er  he  goes ; 
Peeps  out — and  if  their  comes  a  shower  of  rain. 
Retreats  to  his  small  domicil  amain. 
Touch  but  a  tip  of  him,  a  horn — 'tis  well — 
He  curls  up  in  his  sanctuary  shell. 
He's  his  own  landlord,  his  own  tenant;  stay 
Long  as  he  will,  he  dreads  no  quarter-day. 
Himself  he  boards  and  lodges  ;  both  invites 
And  feasts  himself;  sleeps  with  himself  o' nights. 
He  spares  the  upholsterer  trouble  to  procure 
Chattels  ;  himself  is  his  own  furniture, 
And  his  sole  riches.     Whereso'er  he  roam — 
Knock  when  you  will — he's  sure  to  be  at  home. 


IX. 

THE  FEMALE  ORATORS. 

Nigh  Loiulon's  famous  bridge,  a  gate  more  famed 
Stands,  or  once  stood,  from  old  Bolinus  named, 
So  judged  antiquity  ;  and  therein  wrongs 
A  name,  alhisivc  strictly  to  ttro  tonirucs* 
Her  school  liard  by  lh<;  goddess  Rhetoric  opes, 
And  gratis  deals  to  oyster-wives  her  tropes. 
AVith  Nen'-id  green,  green  Nereid  dispiUes, 
Replies,  rejoins,  confutes,  and  still  confutes. 
One  her  coarse  sense  by  metaphors  expounds, 
And  one  in  literalities  abounds  ; 

•  BiUingis  in  the  Latin. 


428  ODE. 

In  mood  and  figure  these  keep  up  the  din ; 
Words  muhiply,  and  every  word  tells  in. 
Her  hundred  throats  here  bawling  Slander  strains  ; 
And  unclothed  Venus  to  her  tongue  gives  reins 
In  terms  which  Demosthenic  force  outgo, 
And  baldest  jests  of  foul-mouth'd  Cicero. 
Right  in  the  midst  great  Ate  keeps  her  stand, 
And  from  her  sovereign  station  taints  the  land. 
Hence  pulpits  rail  ;  grave  senates  learn  to  jar  ; 
Quacks  scold  ;  and  Billinsgate  infects  the  bar. 


PINDARIC  ODE  TO  THE  TREAD-MILL. 

I. 

Inspire  my  spirit,  spirit  of  De  Foe, 

That  sang  the  pillory, 

In  loftier  strains  to  show 

A  more  sublime  machine 

Than  that  where  thou  wert  seen, 

With  neck  outstretch'd  and  shoulders  ill  awry. 

Courting  coarse  plaudits  from  the  vile  crowds  below- 

A  most  unseemly  show  ! 

IT. 

In  such  a  place 

Who  could  expose  thy  face, 

Historiographer  of  deathless  Crusoe  ! 

That  paint'st  the  strife 

And  all  the  naked  ills  of  savage  life, 

Far  above  Rousseau  ? 

Rather  myself  had  stood 

In  that  ignoble  wood, 

Bare  to  the  mob,  on  holyday  or  high  day. 

If  naught  else  could  atone 

For  waggish  libel, 

I  swear  on  the  Bible, 

I  would  have  spared  him  for  thy  sake  alone, 

Man  Friday ! 

III. 

Our  ancestors*  were  sour  days, 
Great  master  of  romance  ! 


ODE.  429 

A  milder  doom  had  fallen  to  thy  chance 
In  our  days  : 
Thy  sole  assignment 
Some  solitary  confinement, 
(Not  worth  thy  care  a  carrot,) 
Where  in  world-hidden  cell 
Thou  thy  own  Crusoe  might  have  acted  well, 
Only  without  the  parrot ; 
By  sure  experience  taught  to  know 
Whether  the  qualms  thou  mak'st  him  feel  were  truly 
such  or  no. 

IV. 

But  stay  !  methinks  in  statelier  measure — 

A  more  companionable  pleasure — 

I  see  thy  steps  the  mighty  tread-mill  trace 

(The  subject  of  my  song, 

Delay'd,  however,  long,) 

And  some  of  thine  own  race, 

To  keep  thee  company,  thou  bring'st  with  thee  along 

There  with  thee  go, 

Link'd  in  like  sentence, 

With  regulated  pace  and  footing  slow, 

Each  old  acquaintance, 

Rogue — harlot — thief — that  live  to  future  ages  ; 

Through  many  a  labour'd  tome, 

Rankly  embalm'd  in  thy  too  natural  passes. 

Faith,  friend  De  Foe,  thou  art  quite  at  home  ! 

Not  one  of  thy  great  offspring  thou  dost  lack, 

From  pirate  Singleton  to  pilfering  Jack. 

Here  Flandrian  Moll  her  brazen  incest  brags  ; 

A'^ice-stripp'd  Roxana,  penitent  in  rags, 

There  points  to  Amy,  treading  equal  chimes, 

The  faithful  handmaid  to  her  faitliless  crimes. 

V. 

Incompetent  my  song  to  raise 

To  its  just  height  thy  praise, 

Great  mill  ! 

That  by  thy  motion  ])roper 

(No  thanks  to  wind,  or  sail,  or  working  rill) 

Grinding  that  stubborn  corn,  tlie  human  will, 

Turn'st  out  men's  consciences, 

That  were  begrimed  before,  as  clean  and  sweet 

As  flour  from  purest  wheat, 

Into  thy  hopper. 


430  EPICEDIUM. 

All  reformation  short  of  thee  but  nonsense  is, 
Or  human,  or  divine. 

VI. 

Compared  with  thee. 

What  are  the  labours  of  that  jumping  sect, 

Which  feeble  laws  connive  at  rather  than  respect  ? 

Thou  dost  not  bump. 

Or  jump, 

But  walk  men  into  virtue  ;  between  crime 

And  slow  repentance  giving  breathing  time, 

And  leisure  to  be  good  ; 

Instructing  with  discretion  demi-reps 

How  to  direct  their  steps. 

VII. 

Thou  best  philosopher  made  out  of  wood ! 

Not  that  which  framed  the  tub, 

Where  sat  the  cynic  cub, 

With  nothing  in  his  bosom  sympathetic  ; 

But  from  those  groves  derived,  I  deem. 

Where  Plato  nursed  his  dream 

Of  immortality ; 

Seeing  that  clearly 

Thy  system  all  is  merely 

Peripatetic. 

Thou  to  thy  pupils  dost  such  lessons  give 

Of  how  to  live 

With  temperance,  sobriety,  morality, 

(A  new  art,) 

That  from  thy  school,  by  force  of  virtuous  deeds. 

Each  Tyro  now  proceeds 

A  "  Walking  Stewart !" 


GOING  OR  GONE. 

I. 

Fine  raerrv  franions, 
Wanton  companions. 
My  days  are  ev'n  banyans 
With  thinking  upon  ye ! 


EPICEDIUM.  431 

How  Death,  that  last  stinger, 
Finis-writer,  end-bringer, 
Has  laid  his  chill  finger, 
Or  is  laying  on  ye. 

n. 

There's  rich  Kitty  Wheatley, 
With  footing  it  featly 
That  took  me  completely, 

She  sleeps  in  the  Kirk  House ; 
And  poor  Polly  Perkin, 
Whose  dad  was  still  firking 
The  jolly  ale  firkin, 

She's  gone  to  the  work-house  ; 

m. 

Fine  gard'ner,  Ben  Carter, 
(In  ten  counties  no  smarter,) 
Has  ta'en  his  departure 

For  Proserpine's  orchards ; 
And  Lily,  postillion, 
With  cheeks  of  vermilion, 
Is  one  of  a  million 

That  fill  up  the  churchyards  ; 

IV. 

And,  lusty  as  Dido, 
Fat  Clemitson's  widow 
Flits  now  a  small  shadow 

By  Stygian  hid  ford ; 
And  good  Master  Clapton 
Has  thirty  years  nap't  on, 
The  ground  he  last  hap't  on, 

Intomb'd  by  fair  Widford  ; 


And  gallant  Tom  Dockwra, 
Of  Nature's  finest  crockery. 
Now  but  thin  air  and  mockery, 

liurks  by  Avernus, 
Whose  honest  grasp  of  hand 
Still,  while  his  life  did  stand, 
At  friend's  or  foe's  command. 

Almost  did  bum  us. 


432  EPICEDIUM. 

VI. 


Roger  de  Coverley 

Not  more  good  man  than  he ; 

Yet  has  he  equally 

Push'd  for  Cocytus, 
With  drivelUng  Worral, 
And  wicked  old  Dorrell, 
'Gainst  whom  I've  a  quarrel, 

Whose  end  might  affright  us ! 

VII. 

Kindly  hearts  have  I  known ; 
Kindly  hearts,  they  are  flown ; 
Here  and  there  if  but  one 

Linger  yet  uneffaced, 
Imbecile  tottering  elves, 
Soon  to  be  wreck'd  on  shelves. 
These  scarce  are  half  themselves, 

With  age  and  care  crazed. 

VIII. 

But  this  day  Fanny  Hutton 
Her  last  dress  has  put  on ; 
Her  fine  lessons  forgotten, 

She  died  as  the  dunce  died  ; 
And  prim  Betsy  Chambers, 
Decay'd  in  her  members, 
No  longer  remembers 

Things,  as  she  once  did ; 

IX. 

And  prudent  Miss  Wither 
Not  in  jest  now  doth  wither^ 
And  soon  must  go — whither 

Nor  I  well,  nor  you  know  ; 
And  flaunting  Miss  Waller, 
That  soon  must  befall  her, 
Whence  none  can  recall  her. 

Though  proud  once  as  Juno  ! 


FREE    THOUGHTS.  433 


FREE  THOUGHTS  ON  SEVERAL  EMINENT  COM- 

POSERS. 

Some  cry  up  Haydn,  some  Mozart, 
Just  as  the  whim  bites  ;  for  my  part, 
I  do  not  care  a  farthino-  candle 
For  either  of  them,  or  for  Handel. 
Cannot  a  man  live  free  and  easy 
Without  admiring  Pergolcsi  ? 
Or  through  the  world  with  comfort  go 
That  never  heard  of  Doctor  Blow  ? 
So  help  me  Heaven,  I  hardly  have  ; 
And  yet  I  eat,  and  drink,  and  shave 
Like  other  people,  if  you  watch  it, 
And  know  no  more  of  stave  or  crotchet 
Than  did  the  primitive  Peruvians  ; 
Or  those  old  ante-queer-diluvians 
That  lived  in  the  unwash'd  world  with  Jubal, 
Before  that  dirty  blacksmith  Tubal 
By  stroke  on  anvil,  or  by  summ'at, 
Found  out,  to  his  great  surprise,  the  gamut. 
I  care  no  more  for  Cimarosa, 
Than  he  did  for  Salvator  Rosa, 
Being  no  painter  ;  and  bad  luck 
Be  mine,  if  I  can  bear  that  Gluck  ! 
Old  Tycho  Brahe  and  modern  Herschcl 
Had  something  in  them;  but  who's  Purcel? 
The  devil  with  his  foot  so  cloven, 
For  aught  I  care,  may  take  Beethoven  ; 
And  if  the  bargain  does  not  suit, 
ril  throw  him  Weber  in  to  boot. 
There's  not  tlic  splitting  of  a  splinter 
To  choose  'twc(!n  liim  hist  named  and  Winter 
Of  Doctor  Pcpusch  old  Queen  Dido 
Knew  just  as  much,  (iod  knows,  as  I  do. 
I  would  not  go  four  miles  to  visit 
Sebastian  Bach  ;  (or  Batch,  which  is  it  ?) 
No  more  I  would  for  Bononrini. 
As  for  Novello,  or  Rossini, 
I  shall  not  say  a  word  to  grieve  'em, 
Because  they're  living;  so  I  leave  'em. 
Vol  L— 37  T 


,    —       > 


i 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CAlffORNIA  UBRAKY 


28    1947 
APR      4    iW 


71" 


MAY   :if 


50UVSC 


LD21-I00m-12,'46(A2012 


ssi- 


I .  i 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


